Sephiroth - Draconian Poetry
Ulf Söderberg makes ambient tribal thunder, dark soundtracks of exploration into un-chartered jungles. Jaguars growl from dense undergrowth, alien birds with brittle wings cry from the heavy bower of twisted trees and the wind sings wordless arias through reed and bark and leaf. But, always -- like the perpetual presence of natives stalking you through the verdant foliage -- there is the menace of drums. Tribal percussion explodes in an instant, shaking the trees, scaring off the birds in a tinkling sound of breaking feathers and making the earth shake like a herd of charging elephants. Draconian Poetry is Marlowe's feverish nightmare ride up the turgid river in the pursuit of Mr. Kurtz, who has been swallowed by the heart of darkness.
"The Call of the Serpent" builds from jungle ambience -- the distant hue and cry of native voices, the faint echo of stone tools against wood and the guttering rumble of the jaguar in the brush -- until, like the sudden tightening of your chest with fear, everything freezes for a second in that infinitesimal silence before a storm breaks. Huge kettledrums shake the sky with their relentless beat. The percussion in "Uthul Khulture" is preceded by a priest's droning ululation, a ritual cry for combat, that sends the Pictish army hiding in the jungle streaming into the trees, resplendent with war paint and sharp feathers. An elongated air raid siren is a distorted cry ripped loose from the panicked reaction of the soft European intruders, the signal to flee before the onslaught of rhythmically excited natives.
The slow drums of "Dark Garden" and the tonal groans of native singers plays out like Peter Gabriel's Passion soundtrack played back at half speed; while "Therasia" blows like a moist wind across an abandoned camp. Breathy drones of sound flow across the empty clearing, dampening the silent tents and discarded equipment with a wet fog, heavy with spores and fungi. Orchestral swirls of strings vie with the wind to produce a claustrophobic ambience of disappearing light.
"A Map of Eden before the Storms" builds from the dreadful ambience of "Therasia" before erupting into tribal percussion. Söderberg layers on the drums, making it sound like he has an entire forest tribe in the studio with him. "The Clock of Distant Dreams" mixes a bit of Morthound's dark ambience with shifting tribal drums and hand percussion beneath a slowly changing tonal melody. Mood music for a massive march, thousands of men and horses bearing across dead seabeds to a bristling stronghold at the base of a mountain range. "Now Night Her Course Began" is the slow dissolution of the world. The sounds of the jungle begin to slow down, stretching and undulating as their elasticity decays and they become long notes, an amorphous benediction to the fall of night.
I've been a fan of Ulf's work since his early self-released records and Draconian Poetry is a refinement of his tribal ambience, a further darkening of the atmospheres with more explosive violence lurking at the periphery of the musical landscape. This record will leave you feeling haunted and hunted, afraid of the bestial forces that lie beyond the edge of the firelight, in the dark places on the map. This is mythological poetry, the savage heartbeat of the untamed world.
Sephiroth
Cold Meat Industry [2005]
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