Locrian With Christoph Heemann

There is definitely an incredibly creeped out vibe coming out of my speakers right now, and I mean that in only the best possible way because the tension building dark ambience of this inspired collaboration is a work of what could be a singular artist as the music is so spot on in its execution and delivery that the idea that this is a collaboration is almost mind blowing; in many collaborations one might hear where one collaborator’s “voice” is and where the counterpart collaborator’s sound is and that is certainly not the case with this work by Locrian and Christoph Heemann (save for the last track, “The Drowned Forest”, which contains some obviously Locrian elements).

While there is certainly an element of creepy feelings that do emanate from the speakers while these four pieces play, the mood is definitely deceivingly ominous bordering on a subtle menace that slyly hides underneath what at times are rather beautiful moments of quiet reserve (the piano parts in “Hecatomb” are wonderful) scattered throughout the music on this beast of an album; but that tense feeling of dread is there peaking out from behind the shimmering percussion and gentle guitar strums in “Loathe the Night” that is only intensified when the strained screams kick in amongst the creaks and groans that add to the subtle cacophony, and the suspense keeps going straight through “Edgeless City” but with a different tact as the ambient sounds are joined by a mechanistic sounding thrum that is unsettling in the way that one might hear a distant stalker down a long dark corridor.

With this record, Locrian and Christoph Heemann use all the aural hemisphere with every sound and absence of sound being direct and purposeful sparing no out of place bleeps or screech in an economical and judicious purposing of every inch of the audible zone, and it is this element or quality that affords the album a seemingly real physical space that garners (with the right amount of imagination) some very vivid mental images.

Locrian With Christoph Heemann is an understated album that is a wonderfully executed and beautifully composed collaborative album that is a must hear for anyone interested in their music having brooding ambience, and getting to hear two camps of masters possibly at the top of their alchemical powers is a treat in it of itself; Locrian and Christoph Heemann have crafted a record that helps you lose yourself in its sounds forgetting the elapsing of time around you while sinking into the many layers of eargasms that each song offers.

8.5 / 10 — Bob