Bremen-based duo Stefan Knappe and Martin Gitschel have certainly been working together in the ambient / noise realm for many years now, first forming their partnership Troum (Old German for ‘dream’) upon the dissolution of their former ambient industrial band Maeror Tri back in 1996. Since then, Troum have been responsible for an intimidatingly prolific flow of subsequent releases, mainly of them restricted to ultra-limited pressing runs. Particularly interesting also is the duo’s creative approach, eschewing the use of computers in favour of building their vast, drone-based soundscapes with more unpredictable elements such as gongs, balalaika and melodicas. It’s an aesthetic that remains firmly in evidence on this latest album for Beta-Lactam Ring ‘Eald-Ge-Streon.’
Opening track ‘Elation’ represents the more synthetic end of the equation, with vast sweeps of orchestral pads rolling their way like thunderclouds across a forbidding yet majestic backdrop of drones and swelling, symphonic chords, evoking a sensation similar to a meeting between Earth and Vangelis. Elsewhere however, ‘Usque Sumus Lux’ sees a gathering wall of rattling and scraping percussive textures bleeding into a spectacular fog of icy synths and wall of sound guitar distortion, calling to mind some of the emotionally vulnerable areas explored on Sunn’s recent material, before a cover of Savage Republic’s ‘Procession’ brings clattering, reverbed out drum rhythms down like a cloak around eerie, distant sounding vocals and icy, funereal synthscapes in what’s easily this album’s most conventionally ‘song oriented’ inclusion. With ‘Eald-Ge-Streon’, Troum have certainly managed to evoke an atmosphere that’s somewhat all-encompassing and vast, but also very much their own. Special mention must also be made of the spectacular, book-bound packaging (with art by Sunn’s Stephen O’Malley), with the first 500 copies including a second disc containing an additional 30 minute long improvised track titled ‘Abhuna.’
Chris Downton
