Musterion
The Black Lodge CD

"The Black Lodge", a world beyond, is the place were Agent Dale Cooper is trapped. He travels through memories, dreams, Tibet, the works of H.P. Lovecraft and more. The visions of Cooper are seen, heard and felt in this avant-garde and exquisitely dark ambient album from Musterion AKA Simon AA Kölle. The Black Lodge is a place of murder, dreams, mystery, darkness, ancient machines, old memories and horror. A shrieking violin swells into a chaotic babel of sound; a pandemonium that would have lead most men to doubt their own shaking sanity. Inarticulate cries that only mutes can utter, and that rises only in moments of the most terrible fear or anguish. With extreme attention to details this profound opus of the mind leads the listener away from the normal world and into the world of the Black Lodge. Garmonbozia!

The music of Musterion is a cinematic blend of dark ambience, sparse ritualistic percussion, acoustic instrumentation, and carefully placed samples combined with expert sound manipulation and editing. Unlike most dark ambient music, Musterion does not linger on a laborious sonority indefinitely. Rather the music evolves dynamically - shifting instrumentation and impressions effortlessly in a quest to seduce the imagination of the listener. The album consists of vast soundscapes that drift darkly through foreign lands, exotic rituals, and acts of dark ritualistic depravity performed upon the innocent. As the album progresses the listener travels through water bound places in the wild while struggling alongside unknown companions in an effort to escape unseen forces in the night. Time shifts and landscapes morph into new and undetermined lands as if walking through a reality constructed of dreams. What was an open marsh under the stars becomes a moment of deep inner reflection alone in an alley. From the darkness come sinister sounds of unrighteous creatures, romantic nostalgic music wafts by only to dissolve into a rumination of foreign prayers. From all sides come the struggling gurgles of the demented and the screams of the frightened and dying. Just as you become rooted in any of these lengthy songs you blink and find yourself transplanted into yet another surreal reality. From the monasteries of Tibet to the forbidding confines of the “The Black Lodge", you drift in and out of different worlds sometimes as a participant and other times as a victim.

In order to induce such a hallucinatory listening experience Musterion creates music using a wide array of instrumentation ranging from traditional and classical acoustic instruments to purely electronic based sounds. Though many songs are shadowed by dark ominous drones, the music in each song reaches way beyond the range and habit of standard dark ambient music. Musterion has striven to bring experimentalism to dark ambient music and has successfully created a cinematic environment previously only pursued by too few capable musicians.

Like previous deluxe packaged CD’s from HORUS CyclicDaemon, “Musterion” is a multi-sensory experience constructed with artistic precision and noticeable dedication. The CD comes accompanied by an A5 Booklet printed in color on impressive art grade paper. The CD is housed separately in its own art paper sleeve while the CD and Booklet both come nested in a dedicated and shared envelope. Unveiling Musterion is like unwrapping an elaborate gift from afar. The opening of this package reveals an invitation to a dark world filled with mystery, agony, and dark rites.