Autumn Tears — Love Poems for Dying Children - Act I. (1996)

Ethereal darkwave with an ample helping of goth cheese. Organs creek, keyboard-strings weep, and male-female vocals soar through the night sky like lost spirits.

Track listing:

1. They Watch with Closed Eyes

2. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 1. Spring

3. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 2. Summer

4. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 3. Autumn

5. Ode to My Forthcoming Winter: Part 4. Winter

6. The Eloquent Sleep

7. And Then the Whispering...

8. One Tender Kiss (The Lost Seasons) - Prelude to the Garden of Crystalline Dreams

9. Carfax Abbey

My children of sadness

I welcome thee into my arms forever

You might also like:

Arcana - Dark Age of Reason (1996)

Dargaard - Eternity Rites (1999)

Vieo Abiungo - Blood Memory (2010)

Related:

Tokyo Bloodworm - Tokyo Bloodworm (2007)

Dark but colorful instrumentals from American musician William Ryan Fritch. Lands somewhere between freak folk and neoclassical, with some Afrobeat and Indian elements for good measure. There have got to be upwards of 20 different instruments are on this thing, and impressively, Fritch plays them all.

Track listing:

1. Borne Harshly

2. Nervous Laughter

3. In a Wash or Haze

4. White Faced Rotted Teeth

5. Cote d'Ivoire

6. Gaunt Wolves with Buzzard Beaks

7. Rust and Bile

8. Sweat. Thick Like Blood or Honey

9. Parading on Broken Glass

10. Red Earthen Mouths

11. Rain Like Burnt Sugar

12. Fugue

13. Blood Memory

Feast before harvest

If you like this, check out:

Ginnungagap - Remeindre (2004)

Helena Espvall - Nimis & Arx (2006)

Es - Kaikkeuden kauneus ja käsittämättömyys (2004)

Related:

Kemialliset Ystävät - Kellari Juniversumi (2002)

Finnish experimental sounds that touch predominantly on drone, neoclassical, and musique concrète. Mysterious, beautiful, and often much darker than that relatively whimsical album cover might suggest.

Track listing:

1. Surullisille, onnettomille...

2. Hamuavia

3. Pehmeä iho

4. Huumaava ikuisuus

5. Puutarhaan lasketuu höyhen

6. Juhlat

7. Sädekellot

8. Sadepäivät

9. Aavehuminaa (katjalle)

10. Kaikkeuden kauneus ja käsittämättömyys

Don't die yet

You should also hear:

Coil - Moon's Milk (In Four Phases) (2002)

Islaja - Palaa Aurinkoon (2005)

Vampillia - Alchemic Heart (2011)

Related:
Skin - Shame, Humility, Revenge (1988)
Boredoms - Super Roots 7 (1998)
Mono & World's End Girlfriend - Palmless Prayer / Mass Murder Refrain (2005)
Vampillia - Rule the World / Deathtiny Land (2011)

Transcendent debut album from this self-described "brutal orchestra." Two expansive compositions encompassing beautiful, shimmering drone; vocals that range from death metal growls to haunting operatic singing; massive walls of tremolo-picked guitars and strings; devastating poetry courtesy of Jarboe; and Merzbow doing that thing that he does. Absolutely brilliant stuff.

Track listing:
1. Sea
2. Land

I breathe in the darkness
To breathe out light
To breathe out fire

Also listen to:

Asva -
What You Don't Know Is Frontier
(2008)

Locrian & Mammifer -
Bless Them That Curse You
(2011)

Dernière Volonté - Les Blessures de l'Ombre (2003)

Synth-heavy, martial-industrial-neofolk. A perfect example of the kind of music I tend to listen to when I'm sick, which I am.

Track listing:
1. Ouverture
2. Le Poison
3. Vienna
4. Les Orages du Crime
5. Les Yeux Fermés
6. La Foudre et le Tonnerre
7. Un Dernier Crépscule
8. Vers la Lumière
9. La Source
10. Ton Visage de Papier
11. Les Blessures de l'Ombre
12. Souvenir de Demain
13. Si...
14. Au Revoir

Choosing to suffer

More like this:

Ordo Equilibrio -
The Triumph of Light... and Thy
Thirteen Shadows of Love (1997)

The Days of the Trumpet Call -
I Saw No Temple in the City (2001)

black tape for a blue girl - Mesmerized by the Sirens (1987)

Related:
Sam Rosenthal - Before the Buildings Fell (1986)
black tape for a blue girl - A Chaos of Desire (1991)

Second album of lovelorn ethereal-wave from these legends thereof. A lush cloud of drifting synths and chiming, folk-y acoustic guitars, with (by my count) eight separate vocalists providing performances ranging from angelic to dramatic, quasi-operatic tremors. As the years go by, the things that once bothered me about this band seem to melt away, leaving me with a band operating completely in their own lane, creating a synth-based sound-world of wrenching heartbreak with aching, almost otherworldly sincerity.

Track listing:
1. Jamais Pars
2. A Teardrop Left Behind
3. Dark Skinned and Inviting
4. Lie Broken, Bleeding
5. Hairline Sunlight
6. With a Million Tears
7. The Sawdust Scatter
8. Beneath the Planks
9. Scream, My Shallow
10. Seireenien Lumoama

Hide in yourself

You should also listen to:

Lycia - The Burning Circle
and Then Dust (1995)

Arcana -
Dark Age of Reason (1996)

David Darling - Cello (1992)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:
David Darling - Journal October (1979)
David Darling - Cycles (1982)
Ketil Bjørnstad & David Darling - The River (1997)
Ketil Bjørnstad, David Darling, Terje Rypdal, & Jon Christensen - The Sea (1995) + The Sea II (1998)

Breathtaking ambient neoclassical pieces for cello from one of my favorites. Texturally lush layers of reverb-soaked cellos form weightless but dark masses of sound. You don't listen to Cello so much as you allow yourself to be submerged in it.

Track listing:
1. Darkwood
2. No Place Nowhere
3. Fables
4. Darkwood II
5. Lament
6. Two or Three Things
7. Indiana Indian
8. Totem
9. Psalm
10. Choral
11. The Bell
12. In November
13. Darkwood III

Shadows of the moon

You should also listen to:

Lisa Gerrard & Patrick Cassidy -
Immortal Memory (2004)

Zoe Keating -
One Cello x 16: Natoma (2005)

Coil - Moon's Milk (In Four Phases) (2002)

Previously on OPIUM HUM:
ELpH vs. Coil - Worship the Glitch (1995)
Coil - Constant Shallowness Leads to Evil (2000)

The other day, a commenter asked me for an all-time top 10 list, and despite having whipped it up with relatively little hemming and hawing, I actually stand behind it -- for the interested, it can be found in the comments section of this post. Obviously, there are a few other albums that just as well could have been included -- Low's The Curtain Hits the Cast springs to mind -- but overall, I can't really think of many albums that I like more than those ones.

So now that I'm on a favorites kick: Coil are, obviously, one of my all-time favorite artists, and Moon's Milk, which runs the gamut from beautiful, organic-sounding drone to cryptic spoken word over minimal synth to digitally annihilated noise, is definitely some of their best work. It's technically a compilation of four EPs, each one representing one of the seasons and released accordingly, but, as you could guess, it plays out phenomenally as a whole.

Track listing:
   -Disc One-
1. Moon's Milk or Under an Unquiet Skull, Part One
2. Moon's Milk or Under an Unquiet Skull, Part Two
3. Bee Sting
4. Glowworms/Waveforms
5. Summer Substructures
6. A Warning from the Sun (For Fritz) / Amethyst Deceivers (Live)
   -Disc Two-
1. Regel
2. Rosa Decidua
3. Switches
4. The Auto-Asphyxiating Hierophant
5. Amethyst Deceivers
6. A White Rainbow
7. North
8. Magnetic North
9. Christmas Is Now Drawing Near

Pay your respects to the vultures
for they are your future

You should also listen to:

Steven Stapleton & Tony Wakeford -
Revenge of the Selfish Shellfish (1992)

Various Artists - Infernal Proteus
(A Musical Herbal) (2002)

Sturmast ‎- Ibis Redibis Nunquam In Bello Peribis (2007)

Hungarian neofolk-infused martial industrial. An anxious yet mesmerizing world of bombastic horns, pounding percussion, echoing, distorted shouts, samples, sharp acoustic strumming, various folk instruments, and massive drones. I honestly didn't know what to make of this album when I first heard it, but it has aged extremely well, gradually revealing itself as a remarkable, singular work.

Track listing:
1. Solum Ipsum
2. My Prayer Is My Inner Armour
3. Kraft
4. The Big Play
5. For Everyone Circus and Bread!
6. Veni Vidi Vici
7. The Regiment Is Departing

Compromise is not possible

If you like this, you should also hear:

Ordo Equilibrio - The Triumph of Light...
and Thy Thirteen Shadows of Love (1997)

Combative Alignment -
Everlasting Sun (2003)

Aquilus - Engraved Souls (2005)

Australian symphonic black metal. Their first demo, Engraved Souls finds Aquilus swinging for the fences right out of the gate with an epic, neoclassical-heavy, six-movement song suite. Each piece is totally linear in structure, moving relatively rapidly from idea to idea, but with a consistency and convincingly symphonic compositional approach that helps them to avoid sounding scatterbrained. It's also almost completely instrumental, with long metal-free stretches, which gives the heavier sections an added sense of significance.

Track listing:
1. 1st Movement - The Dead Badger
2. 2nd Movement - Meadows End
3. 3rd Movement - A Mosaic
4. 3rd Movement - In Memoriam
5. 4th Movement - Emancipated
6. 5th Movement - Aubade
7. 6th Movement - Hallowed Sleep
8. 6th Movement - The Late Shadow

I arose from the dream and you were gone
Still embracing ashes of what never was

You should also hear:

Obtained Enslavement -
Witchcraft (1997)

Abhor - I.gne N.atura
R.enovatur I.ntegra (2001)

Various Artists - Infernal Proteus (A Musical Herbal) (2002)

Related:
Alio Die - Sit Tibi Terra Levis / Introspective (1990)
In Gowan Ring - Love Charms (1994)
Ah Cama-Sotz - Terra Infernalis (1999)
Apoptose - Nordland (2000)
Chaos as Shelter - In the Shelter of Chaos (2000)
Lotus Eaters - Alienist on a Pale Horse (2001)
Inade - The Incarnation of the Solar Architects (2009)

Your boy DEAR_SPIRIT is about to leave for a little over a week of touring with my band Rohit, so I'm gonna hit y'all with something special that should take a while to burn through. It's a phenomenal 4-disc compilation of songs by various darkwave, neoclassical, neofolk, and otherwise industrial-adjacent artists, each of which is meant to represent a different herb. What's that? Yes, marijuana is included -- Lotus Eaters are given the honor. Other artists include the rest of the above-linked, as well as Amber Asylum, RAIN, Troum, and a whole bunch more. Full track listing here. You're welcome.

1 - 2 - 3 - 4

You should also listen to:

Forseti -
Windzeit (2002)

Sieben -
Ogham Inside the Night (2005)

Rasputina - Sister Kinderhook (2010)

Since briefly flashing on the peripherals of the mainstream via touring and collaborating with Marilyn Manson at his commercial peak, cellist/vocalist/songwriter/genius Melora Creager has kept busy carving out her own fantastical, completely unique niche in the weirdo musical landscape. She's long since dropped the industrial signifiers, and embraced an ornately organic sound that could be likened to a beefed-up take on that of Thanks for the Ether, the project's much-loved debut. A collection of beautifully bizarre, quasi-historical stories and laments, Sister Kinderhook is IMO the crowning achievement of late-era Rasputina thus far.

Track listing:
1. Sweet Sister Temperance
2. Holocaust of Giants
3. The 2 Miss Leavesn
4. My Night Sky
5. Olde Dance
6. Humankind, as the Sailor
7. Calico Indians
8. Snow-Hen of Austerlitz
9. Dark February
10. Utopian Society
11. Afternoon of the Faun
12. Kinderhook Hoopskirt Works
13. Meant to Be Dutch
14. This, My Porcelain Life

Oh I can wish for duller mind
For more glamour or quiet time
For higher heels or flattened hips
But the nasty truth is at my lips

Also of interest:

Zoe Keating -
One Cello x 16: Natoma (2005)

Orion Rigel Dommisse -
What I Want from You Is Sweet (2007)

Arcana - Dark Age of Reason (1996)

Related:
Sophia - Sigillum Militum (2000)

Swedish ethereal darkwave/neoclassical. Rich symphonic keyboards and dramatic male and female singing create an epically cinematic sound.

Track listing:
1. Our God Weeps
2. Angel of Sorrow
3. Source of Light
4. The Calm Before the Storm
5. Dark Age of Reason
6. Like Statues in the Garden of Dreaming
7. The Oath
8. ... For My Love
9. Serenity
10. The Song of Mourning

Gathering of the storm

For more like this, try:

Die Verbannten Kinder Evas -
Die Verbannten Kinder Evas (1995)

Dark Sanctuary -
Royaume Mélancolique (1999)

The Days of the Trumpet Call - I Saw No Temple in the City (2001)

Synth-based, neofolk-y neoclassical. This band may or may not be fucked up, especially depending on your level of tolerance for this type of thing -- for instance, they're associated with Von Thronstahl -- so I'm really hoping none of this German contains socially or politically vile messages. 'Cause musically, it mostly just sounds like a less campy Creepshow soundtrack.

Track listing:
1. Oh Trost der Welt
2. ... I Saw No Temple in the City
3. Die Sehnsucht So Gross (Meine Stunde Ist Noch Nicht Gekommen I)
4. Oh Tiefe Ohne Grund
5. Bereit Zum Fluge in die Sterne
6. In Demut, in Ewigkeit
7. Epilog (Meine Stunde Ist Noch Nicht Gekommen II)

The horseman held a sword

You should also hear:

Die Verbannten Kinder Evas -
Die Verbannten Kinder Evas (1995)

Moon Far Away -
Sator (2000)

Orion Rigel Dommisse - What I Want from You Is Sweet (2007)

Dark, cello-based folk from American musician Orion Rigel Dommisse. Layers and layers of cello and synths, with gently off-kilter vocal melodies sung in a sweet (perhaps sardonically so) lilt.

I generally try to avoid making assumptions about people's influences, as it's been done to me multiple times in reviews that have asserted that I'm influenced by artists who I've never even fucking heard of, and it's extremely frustrating. That being said, Dommisse is clearly a Rasputina fan, but she has a greater sense of subtlety, not to mention more palatable vocals.

Track listing:
1. Fake Yer Death
2. Alice and Sarah
3. Simon Sent for Me
4. A Faceless Death
5. Capricorn
6. Ashes from Your Burning Wood
7. Suicide Kiss (Because Dead)
8. A Giver
9. Little Neighbor
10. Drink Yourself (To Death)

The dead showed no one warmth

If you like this, try:

Espers -
Espers (2003)

Mi and L'Au -
Mi and L'Au (2005)

black tape for a blue girl - A Chaos of Desire (1991)

Related:
Sam Rosenthal - Before the Buildings Fell (1986)

Ethereal darkwave. Lush swaths of interwoven, textured synths, mournful violins, and dramatic, at times theatrical vocals. Is your cheese-o-meter going to twitch? Sure. But, if I may, I'd encourage you to ease back on your need for disaffected coolness, and simply appreciate the purity of this band's dedication to their explorations of love, heartbreak, self-hate, and mortality. Plus, the synths are super rad.

Track listing:
1. These Fleeting Moments
2. A Chaos of Desire
3. Pandora's Box
4. Tear Love from My Mind
5. The Hypocrite Is Me
6. Beneath the Icy Floe
7. We Watch Our Sad-Eyed Angel Fall
8. One Last Breath
9. One of These Reminders
10. How Can You Forget Love?
11. Chains of Color
12. Could I Stay the Honest One?

Shine shattered lights into my eyes

You should also listen to:

Dark Sanctuary -
Royaume Mélancolique (1999)

Halgrath -
Liquid Mind (2010)

Jocelyn Montgomery with David Lynch - Lux Vivens (The Music of Hildegard von Bingen) (1998)

Related:
Julee Cruise - Floating into the Night (1989) + The Voice of Love (1993)
Chrysta Bell - This Train (2011)

Haunting, centuries-old vocal works sung with reverence and grace by UK musician Jocelyn Montgomery, and accompanied by cavernous dark ambience, lush strings, and more, courtesy of one Mr. David Lynch.

Track listing:
1. Flame and Vision
2. Sapientie
3. O Tu Illustrata
4. Et Ideo
5. Viridissima
6. Battle and Aftermath
7. Gloria Patri
8. Lux Vivens
9. Deus Enim
10. Clarissima
11. Orzchis
12. Caritas
13. Kyrie
14. Hodie
15. Alleluia

Imprisoned in flesh

You should also hear:

Jocelyn Pook -
Deluge (1997)

Lisa Gerrard & Patrick Cassidy -
Immortal Memory (2004)

Helena Espvall - Nimis & Arx (2006)

Related:
Espers - Espers (2003)

Abstract, uneasy instrumentals courtesy of Helena Espvall, who I first heard as cellist for Espers. Somewhere in the realm of way-out free-folk -- dissonant, seemingly improvised tapestries of cello, guitar, recorder, and arhythmic percussion -- with a twist of broken, droning electronics.

Track listing:
1. Idioblast
2. Kretslopp Av Blod Och Stjarnor
3. Nimis & Arx
4. Certainty of the Neverseen
5. Multiplication Broken and Restored I
6. Tidepools
7. The Straight Line Leads to Hell
8. Mar Amarga
9. Purgatory Chasm
10. Multiplication Broken and Restored II
11. Vortex

Our willingness to die

You might also like:

Otomo Yoshihide -
Cathode (1999)

Zoe Keating -
One Cello x 16 = Notoma (2005)

Dargaard - Eternity Rites (1999)

Epic, synthesized symphonic darkwave. An orchestra's worth of keyboard voices, angelic, reverb-drenched singing, and black metal-style rasps.

Track listing:
1. Eternity Rite (Part I: Sight from the Abyss / The Confession and Prophecy)
2. Demon Eyes
3. Fuer Grissa Est Dranka
4. Down to the Halls of the Blind
5. Nightvision
6. Arcanum Mortis
7. Eternity Rite (Part II: Invocation and Bounding)
8. Temple of the Moon
9. ... of Broken Bones
10. Seelenlos
11. Transfer Complete

I am the one you called deep in the night

If you like this, try:

Die Verbannten Kinder Evas -
Die Verbannten Kinder Evas (1995)

Dark Sanctuary -
Royaume Mélancolique (1999)