Mo, 18.04.2016, 20:00 Uhr
The Poisoned Glass
After the demise of Burning Witch in 1998 and going their separate ways, Dahlquist and Edgy59 kept in touch, occasionally making overtures towards working together and knowing that they would when it felt natural. The Poisoned Glass started with the song ‘Silent Vigil‘, a twelve-tone progression Dahlquist had originally intended as a tonal bass solo. After experimenting, he felt that the resulting sound was heavier, more despondent and unforgiving than any of his existing projects and sent the rough mix to Edgy, who understood immediately that this music represented perfectly both voices as a unit. In spite of seemingly limiting instrumentation The Poisoned Glass is far from minimalist; ‘the atmosphere is bleak yet tonally dense, a virtual sonic attic- warm but without air, breathless.‘ It came naturally, and with that the duo formed and set out to record as The Poisoned Glass. On 10 SWORDS, wide steppes of ringing drones link and linger, finding slow, supple harmonious instances, and masochistic examples of the opposite, over which Edgy narrates eloquent batches of lamentation. Sometimes isolating and windswept, often immediate and agonizing, the interplay between his deviant vocals and burgeoning electronics is a key identifier in The Poisoned Glass sound, while Dahlquist’s bass surges intermittently across the record, devastating when cranked up to full power. Pick scrapes sound off like the claustrophobic clamour of jungle animals on ‘Eels’, while elsewhere and over and over again, ill-fitting frequencies pulse in tandem with an unidentified score, leaving the listener suspended in unbearable horror film tension for minutes on end. ‘Verbatim’ surrounds its explosion of a centre piece with an almost sarcastically reverent chant and poltergeist samples, and ‘Silent Vigil’ finds them at their most structured and consequently, at their scariest. 10 SWORDS utilises infinite textures and crawling pace to create a manipulative, negatively influencing flow of sound that is suffocating, suggestive, and sinister to the point of genuine fear – in other words, a huge and affecting achievement from the pair. What began as something of an experiment in 2010, The Poisoned Glass is now being revived, in full force, with the band set to bring their haunting expanses to Roadburn Festival 2016. With this festival showcasing only the best in doom, drone, sludge and experimental heaviness, there is no better home for the duo’s disquieting offerings, with a performance scheduled for Thursday April 14th. Speaking on their inclusion for the upcoming Roadburn, the band had the following to say:“The Poisoned Glass is greatly honoured and more than a little surprised to be part of the Roadburn 2016 roster. If someone had asked us four months ago, “Where do you see The Poisoned Glass being this time next year?”, we never could have envisioned we’d be in Tilburg, playing at Roadburn Festival, sharing the stage with the heaviest bands in the world. This is going to be f*cking great.” Equally excited about their booking is Roadburn’s artist director Walter Hoeijmakers:“The spirit of Burning Witch has always loomed large over Roadburn Festival, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I’m overly excited about Stuart Dahlquist and Edgy59 forming a new, unholy racket, named The Poisoned Glass. The sound of The Poisoned Glass has all that you’re looking for in a orchestral doom band – noisy textures, eerie atmospherics, twisted harmonies, slow, haunting dirges, and tortured vocals by the ultimate goth, Edgy59. Like Burning Witch, The Poisoned Glass will become essential as well for all our damned souls.” Enigmatic and moving, The Poisoned Glass will release their debut LP on Ritual Productions on the 22nd April 2016. http://www.rarelyunable.com/press/the-poisoned-glass/
