Dark Ambient

Dark Ambient (especially in the 1980s referred to as ambient industrial) is a genre of post-industrial music that features an

Raison d’être

ominous, dark droning and often gloomy, monumental or catacombal atmosphere, partially with discordant overtones. It shows similarities towards ambient music, a genre that has been cited as a main influence by many dark ambient artists, both conceptually and compositionally. Although mostly electronically generated, dark ambient also includes the sampling of hand-played instruments and semi-acoustic recording procedures, and is strongly related to ritual industrial music.

Etymology

The term dark ambient was coined in the early 1990s by Roger Karmanik to describe the music of Raison d’être and related artists that are heavily associated with the Cold Meat Industry record label.

Origins and development

Dark ambient has its roots in the 1970s, with the introduction of newer, smaller, and more affordable effects units, synthesizer and sampling technology. Early genre elements can be found on Throbbing Gristle’s 1978 album D.o.A: The Third and Final Report of Throbbing Gristle. Important early precursors of the genre were Tangerine Dream’s early double-album Zeit (1972), which was unlike most of their subsequent

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albums in abandoning any notion of rhythm or definable melody in favour of “darkly” sinuous, occasionally disturbing sonics, and also Affenstunde (1970) by fellow krautrock band Popol Vuh.

Projects like Lustmord, Nocturnal Emissions, and Zoviet France, evolved out of industrial music during the 1980s, and were some of the earliest artists to create consistently dark ambient music. These artists make use of industrial principles such as noise and shock tactics, but wield these elements with more subtlety. Additionally, ambient industrial often has strong occultist tendencies, with a particular leaning toward magick, as expounded by Aleister Crowley, and chaos magic, often giving the music a ritualistic flavor.
Among the artists who produce ambient industrial/dark ambient are Controlled Bleeding, CTI, Coph Nia, Deutsch Nepal, Hafler Trio, Lustmord, Nocturnal Emissions, PGR, Thomas Köner, Zoviet France,[7] Cabaret Voltaire, SPK, Lab Report, Akira Yamaoka, Robin Rimbaud, Endura, Vidna Obmana, Daniel Menche, Lull, Hwyl Nofio, Hieronymus Bosch, and Final. Many of these artists are eclectic in their output, with much of it falling outside ambient industrial. Dark ambient has vibrated also into contemporary classical music. The example can be some solo works of composer Vladimír Hirsch, his project Aghiatrias or composer Jessie Martin.

Characteristics

Coil

Dark ambient often consists of evolving dissonant harmonies of drones and resonances, low frequency rumbles and machine noises, sometimes supplemented by gongs, percussive rhythms, bullroarers, distorted voices and other found sounds, often processed to the point where the original sample cannot be recognized.For example, entire works may be based on radio telescope recordings (Arecibo Trans-Plutonian Transmissions), the babbling of newborn babies (Nocturnal Emissions Mouths of Babes), or sounds recorded through contact microphones on telegraph wires (e.g. Alan Lamb’s Primal Image).
Generally the music tends to evoke a feeling of solitude, melancholy, confinement, and isolation. However, while the theme in the music tends to be “dark” in nature, some artists create more organic soundscapes. Examples of such productions are those of Oöphoi, Alio Die, Mathias Grassow, Tau Ceti, and Klaus Wiese. The Symphonies of the Planets series, a collection of works by Brain/Mind Research inspired by audible-frequency plasma waves recorded by the Voyager unmanned space probes, can also be considered an organic manifestation of dark ambient

The Resonance Association

List of Bands and Artists

0010×0010
Abruptum
Aghiatrias
Akira Yamaoka
Amber Asylum
Peter Andersson
Antimatter
Aphex Twin
Arcana
Atrium Carceri
Aubrey Hodges
Austere
Autopsia
Sara Ayers
Asriel
Bad Sector
Bass Communion
Beherit
Belong
Birchville Cat Motel
Black Dice
Black Funeral
Bohren & der Club of Gore
Brighter Death Now
Eric Brosius
Bull of Heaven
Burzum
Carbon Based Lifeforms
Kim Cascone
Cisfinitum
Claustrum
Coil
Continuum
Controlled Bleeding
Coph Nia
Current 93
Dargaard
Darkspace
Dark Ages
Dark Sanctuary
Death Cube K
Deathprod
Desiderii Marginis
Die Verbannten Kinder Evas
Delerium
Deutsch Nepal
dreamSTATE
Eliane Radigue
Endura
Lawrence English
Brian Eno
Florian-Ayala Fauna
Final
Ben Frost
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
Martin Grech
Jeff Greinke
The Hafler Trio
Halo Manash
Kurt Harland
Have a Nice Life
The Haxan Cloak
Tim Hecker
Heimkveld Kunst
Hieronymus Bosch
Vladimír Hirsch
Hwyl Nofio
Ice Ages
Ildjarn
In Slaughter Natives
Jóhann Jóhannsson
Kammarheit
Kanon Wakeshima
Kelly Bailey
Andrey Kiritchenko
Knurl
Thomas Köner
Kreng
KTL
Lab Report
Lapis Niger
LAShTAL
Leviathan
Lifelover
Life Toward Twilight
Lilith
Loscil
Lull
Lustmord
Maeror Tri
Main
Mark Morgan
Mariae Nascenti
Daniel Menche
Midnight Syndicate
Mindspawn
The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath A Cloud
Mortiis
MOZ
Muslimgauze
Nadja
Nattramn
Necrophorus
Neptune Towers
Phill Niblock
Nine Inch Nails
Nocturnal Emissions
Noisegate
Nortt
Not Your Average Hippy
Nox Arcana
KK Null
Nurse With Wound
Vidna Obmana
Ombient
Oneiroid Psychosis
Oöphoi
Ordo equitum solis
Organum
Charlemagne Palestine
Painkiller
Pantha du Prince
Paysage D’Hiver
Sandro Perri
PGR
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Pimentola
Premature Ejaculation
Proteque
Puissance
PureH
Raison d’être
Rapoon
The Resonance Association
Trent Reznor
Robert Rich
Steve Roach
Rosetta
Atticus Ross
Roto Visage
Karl Sanders
Janek Schaefer
Paul Schütze
Scorn
SleepResearch_Facility
Sophia
Solar Fields
SpaceGhostPurrp
SPK
Stars of the Lid
Steven Wilson
Storm Corrosion
Stratvm Terror
Striborg
Sunn O)))
Soap&Skin
Tangerine Dream
Tetsu Inoue
Robert Scott Thompson
TISM (briefly in the 1980s)
Toroidh
Devin Townsend
Triangular Ascension
Troum
Tenhi
Jason van Wyk
Ulver
Velvet Cacoon
Vision Éternel
Vladimír Hirsch
Wardruna
Wolves in the Throne Room
Wongraven
Xasthur
Za Frûmi
Zoviet France

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