Friday, August 17, 2012

Ambient Imperium I

It's been a while since I posted anything at the Spikey, shame on me. Well, I think it is time for me to break the radio silence and yell something out...

Today I would like to introduce you to our new series, Ambient Imperium. Ambient Imperium introduces you to the world of noise and music - sounds that the Spiky Rat Pack finds proper to colourize our visions of the Dark Millennium.

The idea for the Ambient Imperium was born when I was gathering mood music to inspire me while I was painting. I wanted to find a certain theme for the soundtrack and before I even knew it, I had a nice collection slow ambient music, buzz noises and chilly hums dug from the depths of the Spotify to put me to the right mood.

Here's the first three to dim your minds...

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Penrose Rabbit Hole by Shadow Of The Beat
Dead Soil by Black Sun Temple
Deep Drone by Terry Devine-King

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Sorry for being narrow-minded and only sharing Spotify links with you.

For something similar in visual terms, please check out Fulgrim's The Tears of Isstvan and Neil101's Opus Maius. Both Fulgrim and Neil101 scavenge the WWW and share their curious and wondrous findings with the rest of us, treasures that brilliantly tell the tale of the Warhammer 40.000 universe in the form of modern photographs.

8 comments:

  1. Hey guys..Nice post.. I have been chatting to a few folks about 40k sound/music recently .. something I don't really listen to very much .. music in general..

    Although This piece speaks to me in 40k terms.. reminds me of l'Ange

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMlSE56jncg

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8Sz3OMX3K0


    I made some ambient noise to represent blight drones a while back..

    http://tindeck.com/listen/sxao

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    1. I don't listen to music that much either. When I do, It's because I try to get on certain mood. I don't consume music, so to speak...

      Patrick Bokanowski was nice revelation, thanks mate! Some creepy stuff indeed. Made me feel like I was pushed in the corner by some invisible force, sobbing for my pity existence - distressing and therefor very much like my vision of 40k.

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  2. Nice!

    I did a similar thing, although i was intending to play it in the background of Inquisimunda games. Here are some of the tracks i thought fitted:

    Dr Who series 4 finale theme - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr89EG6cqPQ

    Chaos Gate Soundtrack (seminal 40k music imo) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOXe0RfMHvo
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjrfAfbt72Y
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG-ukxyr5Ug

    Raison d'etre (Dark ambient horror) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHbY9JWzKMg


    Hopefully we get to see the results of the painting session? ;)

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    1. Thanks Vitruvian XVII!

      Dr Who's theme is maybe a bit too flamboyant for my liking, but dark enough to fit the picture. Don't get me wrong! If I played 40k with the guardsmen, I would march them to action with Starship Troopers theme playing on the background. Or maybe not, a bit too corny :D

      The thing is, I feel like there's too much sublimity and majesty in the music that has been done for the Warhammer 40k spin-offs, like Space Marine and other video games.

      I like to think that the universe of Warhammer 40k is cold, ruthless and unfortunate place to be and so the noise that it makes is the lamentation of tragic machines and the sigh of void surrounding desperate Imperium, not something that sounds like my home town's big band along with church choir...

      End of rant ;)

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  3. Forgot to write some short thoughts regarding the music/noise I pasted. I'll keep them short, one line each...

    1. Hive city gang agent infiltrating their rival's HQ...
    2. Metal hallway filtering working noise made by the servitors...
    3. Narrow eyes in shadow staring stars through a hemispherical sky window while nano-machines are whispering notes in person's delicate mechanical ear..

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  4. The artist describes this as an "audio diorama"
    http://www.house-mixes.com/profile/Archangel%20Charlie/play/archangel-charlie---locus-solus---03---the-galaxy-phase-3/

    It captures the horror, the sadness and the sheer "grimness" of mankind's future. I reckon anyway!



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    1. Bolt Grabber, you hit right on the nail! Nice find indeed. Now where can I find parts 1, 2 and 4? :)

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  5. Ah, wow - thanks very much for the nod.

    Curiously enough, Neil and I were talking in an email last week about some music which has been getting me back in the appropriate mood for some grimdark - I was thinking about including some in a 'Life in the Imperium' post over on Isstvan. This week, I've been listening to a lot of M.B. (Maurizio Bianchi) following some reissues of his work - real horrendous electronic death music, specifically his 'Symphony for a Genocide' album (check out Treblinka), and on a more gentle note, some Radoslaw Kurzeja (specifically his 'Lake or Sad War' album).

    Good choices above, by the way, Black Sun Temple are great.

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