KOLDVOID – Wilderness Retreat
KOLDVOID – Wilderness Retreat
Sun & Moon Records
Release Date: Just says March 2023 on the bio and the band’s Facebook page… So imminently.
Running Time: 41:34
Review by Dark Juan
8/10
Alright, my old muck spreaders? I am Dark Juan and I am here to guide you through another listening experience in my own inimitable fashion. I am safely ensconced in Crow Cottage with Mrs Dark Juan and the Smellhounds for another 24 hours before I have to return to the grindstone of young person wrangling having just completed a 126 hour working week where I was obliged to go into work on two occasions extra, because people had got drunk and had hangovers and refused to attend work. As Dark Juan is one of the Senior Wranglers in his organisation, I might have had to be a bit firm with these people as they were shirking their responsibilities.
Now I am not a popular chap.
However, Dark Juan has no fucks to give about this because I am not there to be their friend and frankly if I can go to work with broken ribs and function normally then they can fucking take two paracetamol and (wo)man the fuck up and work through their discomfort.
This was going to turn into a rant about how the young are all workshy bastards and everything, but to be honest they really aren’t. Every good circus has its clowns, and social care has more clowns than most because of the stress of the work and the limited time for carousing and stuff to vent it, and mental health issues run riot so we have to be a little more understanding of people who are probably getting wasted just to forget about having to deal with vulnerable and damaged kids the next day. Thankfully, although not for the masses reading this, music (well, beer as well. Or absinthe. Or single malt whisky. Or bourbon – Simon, we will not mention that staff meeting during COVID again, is that clear? – or tequila) is Dark Juan’s panacea of choice and it is relaxing to write, so here we are…
Today I am spinning something a little bit different on the Platter of Splatter™. Instead of snarling guitars and visceral barks, Dark Juan is subjecting his brainspace to the freezingly cold electronic soundscapes of KOLDVOID, a gentleman from Transylvania who has lots of machines at his command and, it appears to your obedient servant, an overwhelming and all-encompassing love for John Carpenter film soundtracks. ‘Concrete Utopia’ sounding like it belongs at the beginning of a Terminator film, overlaying the clandestine infiltration of a Human enclave by a new-model Terminator with undetectable bio-mechanical weaponry and a seriously deranged targeting system.
The album opens with ‘Space Cathedral’ which is all downtempo, slow burning electronic swoopiness, and for this writer (ha!) invoked an image in an already fevered and overworked imagination of being in a Space Marine Thunderhawk recovering to an Astartes Battle Barge – kilometres of Gothic arches, crenellations and stained glass and quartz, but scarred and repaired, with blackened scorch marks marring flawless metal, and massive, MASSIVE guns. The silence of space is replaced by the shaking of the craft and the roaring of powerful propulsion systems.
‘Stargazer’ is slightly more upbeat, although there are frequent breaks in the tune to be able to swoop around without any percussion, and the whole thing is very reminiscent of the kind of 80s electronic film soundtracks that abounded on lesser-known SF “classics”, especially the ones that were kind of Utopian in outlook. ‘Presence’ is another tune that leads your sight back towards the inky vastness of space, with a feeling of being the rhythmic blinking of lights on an instrument panel, that being the only colour in the capsule where a lone astronaut manages his systems and feels the sheer scale of his insignificance in an uncaring, unending universe of Absolute Zero cold. ‘Cabin Fever’ (my favourite piece on the album) changes the dynamic from spacefaring expansiveness and vast vistas to an uncomfortable, shrinking space that is lit by flickering fluorescent tubes that buzz and clank and it is very oppressive and builds menace and approaching harm masterfully. If you have ever read any of the stuff about the backrooms of the internet you will know what I mean. There’s things behind those anonymous looking doors you really don’t want to encounter…
‘Darkside of the Sun’ is different again – wailing alarm-like sounds overlay a mid-tempo electronic drumbeat that screams (to my imagination) of a countdown as your craft is caught in dizzying gravity streams and boiling radiation as you struggle to maintain structural integrity while gravity fields interact and your motors fluctuate and you apply thrust as hard as your body can stand for the comparative safety and calm of the Lagrange Point of the binary star system you are investigating…
KOLDVOID takes its influences from the laser-lit electronic soundscapes of Jean-Michel Jarre, the sweeping expansiveness of Vangelis, the poppy eclecticism of Tangerine Dream and the electronic ambience of The Orb, as well as the dangerous edge of classic Cold Meat Industry artists. I already mentioned the all-pervading influence of John Carpenter and you can freely add the Shoegaze element of Boards Of Canada to the mix as well as the dark side of the likes of Ulver. This music is what Gunship would play if they were heavily depressed. It’s Carpenter Brut on Quaaludes. It’s Futuristic Dungeon Synth, I guess. It’s the early music of Mortiis combined with modern Industrial touches.
There is a curiously dangerous sounding side to this album – notes are drawn out too long to be comfortable, and mogadon-slow tempos and pulses start to reduce the speed of your heartbeat. It’s like a chilled razor being drawn across your skin. You feel yourself becoming colder as you listen and you become listless and pale, and feel the desire to move and be actively reduce until you can’t move and you are frozen rigid to the spot. It’s also got that feeling of alienation that is Gothic as fuck.
KOLDVOID is electronic musical vampirism.
The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System (Sistemul patentat de evaluare a stropilor de sânge Dark Juan) awards KOLDVOID 8/10 for a record that I totally understand and appreciate to the fullest, but is unlikely to find a large audience in the Metal fanbase, so a mark is deducted for that. Another mark is deducted for the record simply not being Heavy Metal music, although it is Metal as fuck in execution, outlook and my imagined subject matter.
TRACKLISTING:
01. Space Cathedral
02. Wilderness Retreat
03. Cabin Fever
04. Dark Side of the Sun
05. Concrete Utopia
06. Midnight Sky
07. Complete Annihilation of Joy
08. Stargazer
09. Presence
10. Phantom Lights
LINE-UP:
Try as I might I can find absolutely fuck-all information on the internet on the chap behind KOLDVOID but he does everything on the album. He also doesn’t have much of an online presence either so the links below are all I could find…
LINKS:
Disclaimer: This review is solely the property of Dark Juan and Ever Metal. It is strictly forbidden to copy any part of this review, unless you have the strict permission of both parties. Failure to adhere to this will be treated as plagiarism and will be reported to the relevant authorities.
