martedì 1 luglio 2025

Antikatechon: "Echoes from the Aureate Heavens" CD reviewed on "Ver Sacrum"

C’è un silenzio che grava sulle stanze vuote del cosmo. Un silenzio che non è quiete, ma abbandono. Echoes from the Aureate Heavens, ultima discesa sonora di Antikatechon – alias del sempre più ellittico Davide Del Col – è una meditazione su quel silenzio, su ciò che giace oltre le soglie della percezione umana, là dove la luce delle stelle è solo un’eco di fuochi morti. L’album, pubblicato da Heerwegen Tod Production, etichetta polacca nota per la sua dedizione a un underground oscuro e autentico, si presenta come un monolite sonoro, freddo e impassibile. È la terza pubblicazione con la label, e forse la più compiuta, la più lucidamente disperata. Nulla qui cerca il conforto dell’ascoltatore: Antikatechon costruisce ambienti non per abitarli, ma per perdersi dentro, completamente. I tessuti sonori sono spessi come nebbie radioattive, droni che si estendono come deserti elettrificati, ritagliati da affioramenti di armonie elettroniche setose – rare e ingannevoli come miraggi nel vuoto. Non c’è melodia, non c’è ritmo. C’è solo una tensione perenne verso l’oltre, verso ciò che è antico, muto e siderale. Del Col si è mosso nel tempo tra label come Silentes e Rage in Eden, ma con Echoes il suono di Antikatechon raggiunge una forma finale, quasi terminale. La densità cosmica di questi brani evoca forze pre-umane, entità arcaiche sepolte nel firmamento o nella memoria collettiva del tempo. Ogni traccia è un varco: il passaggio attraverso una risonanza metafisica, dove l’umano è ridotto a un sussurro tra frequenze che non parlano più la nostra lingua. Eppure, in mezzo a questo abisso c’è una strana solennità. Come se Del Col, attraverso questo processo di decostruzione e isolamento totale, trovasse una forma di spiritualità terminale. È un’ambientazione sacra, ma senza dio. Una liturgia per universi spenti. A differenza dei suoi lavori precedenti, qui si percepisce un lieve affiorare di speranza ingannatrice: gocce di luce spettrale in un oceano di pece. Ma è una speranza congelata, destinata a dissolversi. Anche nei momenti emotivamente “elevati”, tutto resta imprigionato in una dimensione postuma, come se l’album provenisse da un futuro già morto. In un mondo che grida per visibilità e rumore, Echoes from the Aureate Heavens sceglie il ritiro, l’annichilimento sonoro, la contemplazione di un’esistenza disabitata. È un ascolto che non consola né intrattiene. È un manifesto dell’isolamento ontologico, una cattedrale costruita sul nulla. Per chi ha il coraggio di affrontarlo, questo disco non si dimentica. Non si ascolta: si subisce. Solo 500 copie. Giusto così. Non è musica per tutti. Forse non è nemmeno per noi. Disponibile su Bandcamp: https://antikatechon.bandcamp.com/album/echoes-from-the-aureate-heavens-2.

(Caesar)

https://www.versacrum.com/vs/2025/07/antikatechon-echoes-from-the-aureate-heavens.html?fbclid=IwY2xjawLRKr9leHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFMeHNWWFlyNUtWZjRqeGpnAR5iCsWhNwFoIHVJZtelTD7Fm1ew1DYVaeg3tP48E80ib1BdoPdZjrT9Hx1CfA_aem_H74viVDEmwtsWF8-FSpE7Q

martedì 24 giugno 2025

Antikatechon: new album "Echoes from the Aureate Heavens" out now





Antikatechon "Echoes from the Aureate Heavens" (CD, Heerwegen Tod Production, 2025)


Davide Del Col, mastermind and sound producer behind the moniker of Antikatechon is back with a new Opus for the polish underground label Heerwegen Tod Production. It is the third release printed and distributed by the label. This project has spanned more than a decade with numerous thrilling post-industrial music for droney-noise experimentations and rumbling atmospheric ruminations. Albums have been signed by Silentes, then Rage in Eden before to move among Heerwegen Tod Production. Davide Del Col is also involved in side projects (Molnija Aura, We Promise to Betray) and collaborated at several occasions with Nimh and Day Before Us. "Echoes from the Aureate Heavens" presents uncompromising bleak ambient expanded pieces for colossal sound textures evoking dark futuristic cosmical forces and mystical places underneath from ancient cradles. It operates a balance between unreal, malevolent and aerial feelings with some emotional highlights. Contrary to recent albums of the project, silken electronic chords are put to the fore, giving a more hopeful, pensive and solemn dimension. "Echoes from the Aureate Heavens" is a daunting, alluring and blissful album, available as limited physical edition of 500 copies.

Created by Davide Del Col
Mastered by Giuseppe Verticchio

mercoledì 19 giugno 2024

Cult Of Light: "The Luminous Spiral" CD reviewed on "Igloomag"

The two masterminds behind this new coming project (Davide del Cole and Ascanio Borgia) are recognizable sound artists for those in touch with the understated dark music underground and its various scenes issued from the industrial then subterranean ambient cradles. Here they join forces to offer us a Dante-esque and apocalyptic thrilling noisy manifest. The conceptual background is deeply connected to primordial resonances, mythological resurgences and occult beliefs from engulfed or forgotten heathen religions.

Indeed what catches the ears is the groundbreaking and burgeoning ceremonial and ritual components of the music often immersing the listener in deep, quiet then unsettling or uncanny moods. Reverbered sound motifs meet white noise derelicts, long sustained cavernous drone vibes, and multi layered e-chords of meandering textures with discreet evanescent melodic lines. Fans of death industrialism and ritual ambient might find here a serious interest with pronounced mystical ends.

Recommended for those into the sanctified ascend-spiritual darkness of Skullfower, Necro Death Mort, Endvra, and Common Eider, King Eider. This opus is welcomed by the excellent Zazen Sounds, a key publisher regarding soundscapes in touch with the monolithic heaviness of extreme music genres as well as the darkly meditative inclination of sonic sound ritualism. Next to names such as Nordvargr or Shibalba, from their catalog l would quite recommended the dreary cinematic I Fjellets Hastighet by Sysselmann and the processed chamber acoustic music of The Machair That Covers The Saints.

(Philippe Blache)

https://igloomag.com/reviews/cult-of-light-the-luminous-spiral-zazen-sounds?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR3CaYWx3Vb_hrUkqwKT0qpALWKndV_AhES9EOOkj6qzGSnUeQBjFtw0HJE_aem_ZmFrZWR1bW15MTZieXRlcw

martedì 7 maggio 2024

Cult Of Light: VV.AA. "Stalker - Music inspired by Andrej Tarkowskij's movie" (dl + Cd + Book. Published by Eighth Tower Records)

"Stalker" is Eighth Tower's tribute to the cinematic masterpiece "Stalker" (1979) by Russian director Andrej Tarkowskij. Tarkowskij 's second science fiction film after Solaris, "Stalker" is based on a novel by the Strugackij brothers, Arkadij and Boris, renowned authors of Soviet science fiction. The novel, titled "Roadside Picnic," was released in 1971. With this project Eighth Tower Records, musicians and writers involved, pay passionate homage to this masterpiece of science fiction cinema and, more broadly, the history of cinema.

https://eighthtowerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/stalker-music-inspired-by-andrej-tarkowskijs-movie

martedì 2 aprile 2024

Cult Of Light: debut album "The Luminous Spiral" out now

 














Cult Of Light "The Luminous Spiral" (CD, Zazen Sounds, 2024)


Cult Of Light is the new collaborative project by Davide Del Col and Ascanio Borga. Inspired by ancient cults, folk horror tales and exploration expeditions, the music evokes long forgotten rituals and aims towards uncharted territories where mysterious ancestral forces are still alive and well. The debut album, “The Luminous Spiral” consists in 9 tracks of mesmerizing dark electronics and ever-evolving flux of sonic matter that represent a sonic ritual with tribal and spiritual overtones. Both Davide and Ascanio are reference figures in Italy in the industrial ambient and experimental electronic scene. Davide Del Col is an electronic musician and drummer. His many projects include Antikatechon, We Promise to Betray (with Giuseppe Verticchio/Nimh), Molnija Aura (with Andrea Marutti), Echran (with Fabio Volpi), Ornament. His music was published in many specialzed labels like Afe, Ebria, Small Voices, A Silent Place, Silentes, Oktagön. Ascanio Borga is a electronic musician and guitarist. He released several solo albums with Afe Records and his label Sonic Boundaries. He also collaborated with several musicians in the italian experimental, noise and avant rock scene, like Cristiano Luciani (Cris X), Paolo Taballione (Carillon Del Dolore, Christian Death, Gronge) e Tiziana Lo Conte (Gronge, Roseluxx).
Official Video Teaser: https://youtu.be/FbmPptzjjOI Digital Purchase and subscription at: https://zazensoundspublishings.bandcamp.com/