Jocelyn Montgomery with David Lynch * Lux Vivens (1998 polygram)
David Lynch has made a lot more music than I knew. Yesterday I wrote a little about a new classical soundscape cd and some jazz(rock) releases, later I ran into this album. “Lux Vivens” is the music of the mystic Hildegard von Bingen which Jocelyn Montgomery apparently sings a lot. For this release David Lynch made the background music which in line of most releases that I review I would call “dark ambient” and “soundscapes” and Montgomery’s opera voice would be “heavenly voices”. There is also a little bit of “noise” and here and there a guitar. I am positivily surprised by this album. The “low” (Lynch does not think this album is “dark” since “dark could imply evil”) threatening sound goes wonderfully with the eerie voice of Montgomery. A very enjoyable album!
-4-
According to the label this album “is easily one of the most anticipated records in the neofolk underground scene”. Well, Der Feuerkreiner is a nice band that mixes different kinds of music to their own style, doing that well too, but the selling-line is a little overdone in my opinion. The releases that I already have are very enjoyable, but I do not play them too often. “Unsere Zeit” brings no news in the style of this Italian band. Female vocals sometimes making almost “heavenly voices” music in combination with soft orchestrations, to follow by some harsch and distorted industrial with clear sounds, lots of drumming and bombast. Listening to the new album, the style seems to have been polished a bit and comes out better than before making “Unsere Zeit” a good new album, but without surprises.
Two bands that I find allright, but not great. I do not think I would have bought this cd if it was just a split album, but because this is actually the result of a joint recording, I was interested enough to give this album a try. “Sang Graal” turned out to be a nice album, going from moody ambient soundscapes to more bombastic and martial pieces, folky and orchestral tones and of course ‘ritual’ sounds, because that is an element in both the projects’ sounds. The sounds of the bands go well together and they made a good balance resulting in an album sounding between both of them.
When I ordered this cd I did not realise that it was a rerelease of this classic split project of many years ago. I knew the album, but did not really like it and therefor never bought it, so in the end, I did… The project is interesting. 6 Comm’s ambient soundscapes combined with Aswynn’s recitals of Norse texts, but I happen to not too much like much of the music and also I don’t particularly enjoy Aswynn’s voice and pronounciation. The cd has it’s moments and surely is a classic release for having such a thick layer of paganism so long ago, but in my opinion this rerelease is more for archival reasons than for the quality of the recording.