The Elemental Chrysalis - The Calocyble Collection [Glass Throat Recordings - 2005]The Calocyble Collection is an elegant, haunting and sometimes scary collection of vivid sound worlds. Utilizing Classical guitar work, barren electric guitar, piano, organs, Cello and all manner of other exotic intrestrementasion. This is The Elemental Chrysalis first album - it’s a collaboration Between Chet w. Scott (Ruhr Hunter) and James Woodhead. Though you can hear faint traces of Scott’s work with Ruhr Hunter- this very much has it’s own sound and intent- built more around droning a looping guitar work and brooding ambience. Seemly this is less forest bond than Ruhr Hunter, each track paint’s its own magical and often barren and creepy tale, but it's still very much tied to natural elements. The twenty five minute opener A beautiful head in 5 movements, finds elegant and ornate classical guitar work warmed by soft piano pitter patter. It feels like a walk though a medieval land in the summer time, walking under the shadows of oak trees, then all of sudden all goes black and you become unconscious .Your brains leaping and twirling with distorted elementary god faces, as rich dark droning earth tones easy in, licked by strange primeval percussive matter. You seem to slip in and out of consciousness- at first you been carried, then folded in strange lining. Before long you awake in a small stone carved church on a strange wooden alter adorned with many half animal half human carved faces. You can hear birds singing from out side, but the place is deep in dread as bassy church organ pumps out it’s sad march before drifting back via cello drone to a refrain of the starts melody, though the guitar is still elegant it seems some how downcast, as if your recalling the summers day you walked in the woods- now fading memory, as figures gather around you. Oceans Wreathed in Flame finds as in denser and sinister clouds of droning and building matter- deep carven like sounds tied into tight guitar fluttering tones. Like a slow descent into vast underground cave networks, that hum and mummer with strange calls. The passageways lit with burning animal fat tortures, the passageways just seem to go deeper and deeper, the touch lit growing less and less until you trail on in complete damp darkness. Caravan of ghost enters with backwards guitar picking before settling into intricate and rich classical guitar work led by the Sprightly dance of organ work.It then drifts into lush and almost hypnotic clouds of guitar drone- before eerier and haunting throat singing echoes over the horizon, lifted by angelic voices. Really both hypnotic and magical, I can’t remember the human voice been used in such an enchanted and magical way, in a long time- it brings up goose bumps. The closet feeling I guess comes to is the end of coil's Batwings (A Limnal Hymn) off Their Musik To Play in the dark 2- it’s seems to portray the same old dark religious wonder. An enchanted, deep and important work of audio art, that will find you’ll find your self deeply hypnotise by and lost in. Really I don’t know How Mr Scott keeps doing it- but lets hope he never loose his magic. A special mention should go to the packing- as with all Glass Throat Recordings cd’s it comes housed in an over sized card sleeve that opens up into one of the most wonderful denser rich woodland/ Fungi drawing- Just like the music, it will have you captivated staring at it’s detail. To Buy direct and hear sound samples go here. Roger Batty
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