Svarte Greiner - Knive

Svarte Greiner . Knive . 2006. 4 stars .

This is a spine chilling dark-ambient album from Norway that strives to create a disturbing cinematic experience. Strange rustling, creaks, unsettling drones and haunting choral vocals make subtle exchanges in the black spaces of this record, creating an enveloping atmosphere that has been described as ‘acoustic doom’.

Like avant-garde contemporaries Set Fire to Flames and Northaunt, Svarte Greiner’s disc is difficult to get into but immensely rewarding once you let it slowly seep in under your skin. While there are some meandering sections that just sound like someone clumsily dropping a microphone repeatedly, the later numbers are completely absorbing, as the ghostly, wordless vocals glide across the primal percussion and field recordings. The more refined numbers like "The Black Dress" sound like lost tracks form a David Lynch movie, drawing you into moaning corridors and passageways with no clear direction or aim. All that leads you along is an inescapable sense of dread and unease, the fear of the unknown.

Despite the album’s unevenness, the later half of Knive is engrossing enough to deserve an attentive listen. The level of detail in these soundscapes will be sure to fascinate, as each creeping synth line, shimmering chime and estranged clang pulls you towards a deeper psychic plane. Organic and ethereal, the sounds of Knive will be etched in mind for some time.

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