Ground and Sky Review

Æthenor is a supergroup of sorts involving members of Guapo and Sunn O))), but fans of the former are probably not going to get what they expect. The latter band is the better comparison: if Sunn O))) make doom metal for ambient music fans, Æthenor make ambient music for doom metal fans. Deep In Ocean Sunk the Lamp of Light is an evocative title taken from Homer's Iliad, and is true to the music: claustrophobic, dark, submerged, suffocating, yet somehow simultaneously sweeping and epic.

The density and structure of Guapo or Sunn O))) are altogether absent here; instead, Deep In Ocean consists mainly of fragmented keyboard and organ lines surrounded by carefully placed bumps and scrapes. The sound comes in waves, ebbing and flowing like, as the title might imply, a creaking ghost ship swaying on a dark and turbulent sea. While the tinkling Rhodes in "III" reminds of Guapo at their most formless, the rest of the album is something else entirely. The meat of this brief (barely over 30 minutes) record is in "I" and "II," which seem less like linear pieces of music than they do nightmarish soundtrack fragments. But Æthenor are too clever to fall for cheap horror-movie soundtrack clichés; instead, their tapestry of sound is unsettling by its very amorphousness.

Sound boring? For many, it might be. But for those with the ability to revel in pure sound and texture, Deep In Ocean Sunk the Lamp of Light is a creepily evocative ambient album that, while simple on the surface, is in fact deceptively deep and rewards repeated listening.