Devil’s Hour begins with a harrowing dissonance. This slowly twists to reveal whispers of  demented musicality as the whistling and…

Devil’s Hour begins with a harrowing dissonance. This slowly twists to reveal whispers of  demented musicality as the whistling and general noise rises and falls in pitch. Bleating machinery swirls alongside increasingly worrying pad tones. ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ bathes us in this anxious swaying of sound for the whole track. At points, binary bass notes give some structure, but the fractured and abstractly daunting make-up of the song remains prominent until the very end. 

Angelic Creature also starts with a screeching, hollow tonality. Thundering white noise approaches the listener. A bass note, rising and falling, wades through the untuned murk. Barely cutting into the noise at all as more and more sound fights back against the sequence. ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂’s production style fills the stereo field. A laser-sharp synth begins to fluctuate amongst the sinister shroud. It follows along with the bass to create a wavering sequence that tries to drag the listener from the sea of melancholic noise. It dissipates, leaving only the hardy bassline thundering away. 

Drowsy eases its way in slowly with echoed, fragmented tones. A quaking echo reveals a strange but shockingly pretty location. It feels as if the listener is seeing shooting lights illuminate a strange and archaic cave of some kind. The structure of the location creaks and faraway music leaks from every crevice. The intention is certainly encrypted in such random texture and progression, but the listener feels a definite sense of isolation from the outside world. It seems only them and ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ inhabit the space. 

Ghosts begins with whirring notes reaching high above our heads. It feels as though our surroundings now have an agreeable tonality to them. Another strong synth sequence stakes a claim of logic and growth. And once again, the waves of noise seek to submerge and subsequently extinguish this spark. The two rise up against each other as the scene becomes full of noises clamouring for the listeners attention. Once again, the sensical steps of the tuneful synth outlast the onslaught of chaotic sounds that ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ throws. 

Devil’s Hour begins with a rapidly changing synth sound. The amorphous noise is solid and crystalline one minute, only to become a liquid mess the next. A bass note peaks through as the synth pirouettes uncertain of its form and shape. The style of ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂’s songs always seems to be reaching at some sort of unachievable climax. A fizzling melody begins to play an archaic-sounding lament, it’s power suddenly washes away the deep, slow-moving pads. The original synth is left to fight against itself in an eternal transformation.

Frightening Light’s initial offerings are of echoed tunes turned into nonsensical dissonance. Slowly the listener finds their way through the track as they have done before. ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ moves like a shadow just out of sight, bringing a certain aspect to the fore slowly and unnoticeably. Noise rises, again caught in an unyielding ascending format. Clapping hits us sporadically from within the noise, as if ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ and First kings are taunting us with percussive sounds that could represent rhythm and structure used to randomly attack us. The claps swiftly turn into inaudible chaos and fade away. ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ chips away at the soundscape, and at each conclusion we are left with a hollow shell of residual sound. (Featuring First Kings)

Possessed begins with two synth sounds overlapping each other with descending notes whilst a small click keeps time. A light, airy synth sound starts and we are introduced to one of the most tuneful tracks on the album. The synth string sounds continue to grow in stature seeking to submerge the light tuneful motif. ⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂ pushes the strings right to the very front of the mix and they singe the listeners ears with overwhelming sound and texture. Towards the end, the torrent of sound begins to let a more refined tone slip from its ranks and it rises above all else as the sense of destruction that was wrought turns tuneful. We end once again, with the tuneful arpeggiation. 

Deep Slumber speaks of a different method than what we’ve seen so far. The artist slides in immediately with a shaking drum sequence and a heavy rhythmic bass drum. Huge bass sounds clamber over each other as notes sound randomly from watery bells. A voice is heard, the voice of Lila Tirando A Violeta. She sings in a steady rhythm as speaking begins and drags everything to a sudden fade. 

誘拐‘s looming bassline wanders in and out of focus. Another sense of depth is created as it sounds like the low frequency tones are stretching quite a distance away from us. A chirping melody begins to sound, slowly rising in a wavering scale. The pads push heavily against the tune trying to hammer their way in from the outer rims of the stereo field. It almost feels as if the tune is the listeners beacon amidst a whirling hurricane of torrential noise. The fractured process of a melody leaks from one of the large, overarching synth parts as it rises from the murk of the others.

3am brings razor-sharp synths that unfurl into mellow chords. After a few seconds pass, we are wading through an atmosphere alive with writhing synth notes. A whirring organ sound seems to guide the track. A beautiful stabbing synth peels off from the noise and dissipates suddenly. All fades once again, leading into an alternate version of Deep Slumber. This iteration takes a more dense texture. A hammering drum line warps in and out as a watery synth pings in the maelstrom of noise and cacophonous rhythm. 

⁂V‡▲D‡M∇R⁂’s sense of intricacy shines in even the most nonsensical moments. The artist delights in standing logical stalagmites amidst a chaotic ocean of sound. The listener must bare the brunt of the noise and see what remnants of the original entity still remain afterwards. An intense and textured listen. 

Listen in full/purchase on CD here: https://flamingovapor.bandcamp.com/album/devils-hour