Gravetemple — Ambient/Ruin
In any case, they must have enjoyed the excursion as they produced a second album while preparing for a European tour two years later. This album was 'Ambient/Ruin', referred to more as a 'demo' than an 'official' release by the band. It blends live recordings made during the Israel shows with new work made individually by each member of the band in different corners of the globe - Csihar in Japan, Ambarchi in Australia and O'Malley in France. The original pressing of this was of just 350 CDrs, making this vinyl reissue most welcome and coinciding with the trio's recent third tour.
For those familiar with 'The Holy Down' or Sunn's aesthetic, the most extraordinary aspect of 'Ambient/Ruin' is its strong musique concrète threads weaving through or sometimes abruptly cutting off the exquisitely doomy layers of extended low-end guitar. The album opens with rain falling on a thick, buzzing sub-bass layers that build organically into the soaring, slow crescendo of an angry guitar as finer details like small, spiralling glassy tones dance as if evoked by Csihar's astonishing wraith-like vocals. Just one minute before the end of the piece all this mesmeric, captivating environment is suddenly silenced, replaced by a rough recording of what sounds like someone casually tapping a metal bowl. The effect is sublime, deftly contrasting the prolonged ethereal attack of the preceding 10 minutes with a sudden switch to the mundane.
The second piece also begins with the sloshing of water and sounds of motor cars outside, but with Csihar's insidious and chilling strains claiming "You never existed, I am here now!" the listener is returned to more occult realms, like returning to a dream after briefly waking. The album progresses in this remarkable and most unusual way right to its premature end. From a sense of dark devotion - what sounds like a chorus of wailing souls drowning in murky guitars that can remind of Current 93's early releases - to corroded and blistering cacophonies that are once again suddenly interrupted by bird calls, dogs barking and footsteps.
This occasional disorienting strategy helps the listener focus on the subtleties within Gravetemple's drone each time it re-emerges, while also conjuring the impression of the everyday being ceaselessly invaded by mysterious dark energies. It concludes with monstrous limbs of bass extending out of a polyrhythmic drum tornado, followed by super doomy guitars paint wild arcs in the night sky then plunging back to an earth dappled in starlight before stopping dead for the last time. It's a wonderfully compelling and involving sonic drama, with a daring blend that refuses to fade.