For the music lover who can sit and enjoy the evolving sound of someone else’s nightmares. Out of the countless amount of ambient artists, how can you tell what is better than the rest, or even worth your time? Judging the book by its cover is a standard method but can still lead to useless albums, so does ambient music just have an attraction towards its own potential listeners? Simply, yes, music can actually pick the consumer on the sole of reason of what some call intuition or whatever outwardly force you wish. It’s merely another way music reaches out to you, and with all the fog cluttering the masses, ambient listening seems like yet another method of stepping apart. With Harmonious Euphonies, Dahlia’s Tear begins this passage through expressions any normal mortal wishes to suppress. How welcoming.
Sweden’s recent output of more atmospheric music has been glorious. Besides Dahlia’s Tear, we have Arcana, Atrium Carceri, Desiderii Marginis, Raison d’etre, Rome, and many others thanks to Cold Meat Industry records. But amongst all these acts, they can all stand apart from each other respectfully as they each explore their own realms of creativity. Dahlia’s Tear in particular boasts a more comfortable tone than the rest while retaining the unsettled consciousness dark ambient tends to share. Endless Snow Spiralling Gentle is such a track, with quick piano runs above slow, churning noises and harmonized flutes. The sound effects on the whole album are extremely well-arranged, always adding a new color to the sound. As the title and art of the album might have hinted, the overall sound is fairly celestial, or mystical if you will, which becomes all the more of a grabbing element as the album continues.
While some may misunderstand ambient music as just a bunch of keyboard layers, let them be pathetically mistaken. Anything from white noise to single female choirs to squeaking gears or chiming bells can be found here, amongst the subtle keyboard progressions. Babies crying, women screaming, it’s all good. But what’s important is that none of it feels forced. The arrangements are as natural as can be because of the space provided to allow each section to spread its wealth. Also featured are a few moments of hypnotic string passages beside creaking raindrops for an unknown amount of time, something featured and built upon more and more on the future releases.
As far as musical progression goes, it seems like ambient is starting to take the lead. While most of rock and metal are stuck in pop structures, ambient doesn’t even glance back as it forges its own molds of what music is supposed to sound like, that being whatever the artist envisions to be a worthwhile expression. Dahlia’s Tear is, especially with the next two records, standing at the forefront of this movement along with many dark acts waiting to be found. This is not an album with hooks, but an album meant to overcome you. Music is a higher power, and this is a good start to understand it.
