Let's share and discuss some of the more interesting material in this vein. Some in the dark ambient community would probably wince at calling all of these actual dark ambient, but here I'm pretty loose about it. As much as I tend to like more structured and melodic songs, some of the music in this genre finds a way to circumvent the limitations of our tonal systems by focusing more on texture and subtle development.

Raison d'Etre

Probably my overall favorite artist in the genre. A lot of his work feels very visual, and evokes various settings, sometimes like I'm onboard the Nostromo, floating around.



Hoedh

This is from one of my favorite albums ever, it's almost like minimalistic classical music run through a very murky filter that makes it even more intriguing.



Atrium Carceri

This just feels so...haunted or something. I can recognize what's being played as notes, but they are not like any other notes I've ever heard before, such a surreal, otherworldly feeling to them. I've been a fan of his material in general for quite awhile, but I found this particular piece in-between watching some A24-esque films and it really just suited the creepy mood.



Thomas Koner

Possibly my second favorite overall artist in the genre, it never ceases to astonish me how much mileage he can get out of hardly ever playing anything recognizable as a proper note, but the unraveling and shifting textures are mesmerizing.



Maeror Tri

Probably the most melodic piece here, but so exquisite and sorrowful.



Black Tape For a Blue Girl

Most of their material is more accurately darkwave, but there is so much beauty here with the violins and analog synths.



Steve Roach

Probably the most rhythmic piece here, kind of Berlin school-influenced, but the ethereal synths are just dazzling.



There are many more, but this is a good start.

In terms of Dark Ambient, I definitely like Roman Saenko's Dark Ages project. I've been listening to this album for quite some time now:


Beyond that and maybe a few others, the "spooky dark ambient" stuff isn't really my thing usually.

I suggested on the thread that inspired this one both Brian Eno and Robert Rich. Might as well post them here too. Not exactly dark ambient, but certainly essential ambient.

Brian Eno. I posted Music For Airports on the last one, which is probably one of the most highly revered ambient albums by a large audience. This one is also good though, very different atmosphere, trying to go more for a "drifting in space" vibe, and does it very well.


Robert Rich. This album, Perpetual A Somnium Continuum, is something I can't recommend enough. The atmosphere that's built here is perfect for meditation/studying. I could listen to this for hours and just get totally lost in the soundscape. Apparently it was made with the intent of "influencing the dreams and pre-REM hypnagogic visions of the listener" (from wiki). I don't really know if it does that specifically for me, I only fell asleep once to this album. Nevertheless, it still delivers a solid 8 hours of ambience.

Robert Rich and Steve Roach are brilliant. Then of course we should mention Lustmord because it seems ubiquitous.

Early Tangerine Dream is great too, especially before they got proper sequencers. Moving over to the industrial side of things, Brighter Death Now has some good, harsh and bassy stuff.

You aware of his other project Sabled Sun? More focused on a theme, but otherwise still real good bleak sounding theatrical ambient. As a matter of fact, check out the label Simon Heath (Atrium Carceri's pilot) made that specialized on that theatrical (dark) ambient Cryo Chamber. Some stuff gets a little samey, but there are some like God Body Disconnect, Ager Sonus, Northumbria, and Flowers For Bodysnatchers which make some very stellar stuff.

Just picked up Mortiis's first demo and rounded out the trio of early albums on Bandcamp Friday, as well as getting his album under the Fata Morgana name. A lot of people seem to be turning to dungeon synth these days as a good crossover from metal. I've noticed Diplodocus making waves in recent months.

Kelly Bailey's Portal soundtrack. Possibly the best soundtrack for a Valve game. The ambient pieces that play in the background fit the atmosphere of Aperture so well: polished and pretty-looking, but with tons of rust, darkness, and evil behind the scenes.

His soundtracks for Valve games are generally amazing. "Vague Voices" from the original Half-Life also has a great dark atmosphere.

Yeah, they're classics. I'm not as into normal ambient music, though every now and then I'm in the mood for it. Robert Rich does dabble a bit more with the darker side of it though, like his collaboration project with Lustmord, another mainstay.



Yeah, their stuff is excellent too, though generally a bit too busy and not ominous enough to quite fit, other than a handful of things here and there like Zeit.



I am. Sabled Sun is more drone-based, whereas Atrium Carceri tends to have slightly more going in each composition, at least as far as this sort of thing goes, but both are fantastic for different vibes. Yeah, there are a lot of great artists on there like Herbst9, Kammarheit, and Cities Last Broadcast. The genre is surprisingly large for how little known it is, but of course the same is true for metal's subgenres. Cyclic Law and Cold Meat Industry for example have also had a lot of iconic artists.



I've heard some dungeon synth here and there, but for whatever reason it hasn't connected with me yet. I'm hoping I'll run into the right albums at some point.

Endura aka Endvra is probably household name enough that mentioning them doesn't count as a recommendation because everybody already knows them. One of the first ambient bands I discovered and still enjoying them from time to time.

Well, I'm anything but a genre expert, but there's several albums I really like. Mostly early raison d'être, obviously, and then I'll just post the first tracks

Zamia Lehmanni by SPK:


Deflagration Of Hell by Deutsch Nepal:

I was just listening yesterday to The Axis of Perdition's last EP, Effluvia. It's entirely dark ambient, not their usual chaotic black metal, but the general feeling of darkness and insanity is still there.
For now, it can be downloaded "name your price":
https://anaxisofperdition.bandcamp.com/album/effluvia
Apparently they are now "An" Axis of Perdition, but it's the same band.



"Dungeon synth" and Mortiis have their own flavour; it's a very peculiar kind of dark ambient. But I too recommend his early albums; it's really visionary stuff.
They shun the feeling of post-apocalyptic, urban landscapes that some dark ambient has and instead evoke an arcane, mysterious, ancestral world.



Soundtracks of video games is how I got into the genre and there are a couple that I consider wonderful, though I wouldn't really recommend listening to them on their own without having played the games as they are such an intrinsic part of them.
Nine Inch Nails' soundtrack for the first Quake is a little of an unsung masterpiece; few seem to even remember they did it. It's a game that has a lot of atmosphere and the music really adds to it.
Although it leans towards industrial, it's mostly ambient. It's interesting to hear them dabble in it back then when Reznor still had not made the Ghosts albums and his soundtrack work, which fall within the genre for a good part; it also has a very different feeling from those, much more apocalyptic and evil.



Akira Yamaoka's music for the first three Silent Hill games is also some of the most disturbing and dark one can think of but, again, it makes such an uncanny match with the games' story and atmosphere that it would be extremely limiting to listen to it without having played them.
Also, it is often more industrial, of the "insane factory" kind, than strictly ambient.

Yes. I love the original Quake soundtrack. It's a pity that you need the original CD in order to hear the soundtrack in-game. "Parallel Dimensions" has got to be one of the creepiest pieces of music I've ever heard.

Isn't it available somewhere in a digital format? I believe it was re-issued on vinyl not long ago.
Some source ports support playback in mp3 or ogg.

This is a very cool album by one of the better dark ambient Cold Meat Industry veterans along with two of his other albums Benevolence and Tolerance. Minimalist yet deep, dark yet meditative. And one of the more discernible blurring points between industrial and dark ambient.

I'll third the Quake soundtrack. Unfortunately I'm not really a gamer anymore, but I watch playthroughs of some every now and then, and a lot of survival horror type games tend to have soundtracks or at least pieces that evoke this sort of mood. Maybe it's because I spent far more time watching playthroughs of it than any other game because I'm obsessed with the franchise, but the Alien: Isolation soundtrack is pretty great, for another example.

They certainly do.
This is another gem:



The soundtrack of Cry of Fear. For those not familiar, it's a survival horror game heavily influenced by the classics, developed independently as a Half-Life mod and available for free.
The game has many bugs and technically it's a little rough around the edges, but the atmosphere and aesthetics are so well-made that those shortcomings are easy to overlook if you're a big fan of the genre. And the music contributes very much to that.
I've personally enjoyed the game, but I keep coming back to the music because it's so good.
There's a very depressive undertone that is not very common in horror video games, or pretty much any entertainment product, which is what made the game so unique and the music reflects that as well.

Here are a couple other recommendations.



This is a compilation album. Although it's focused on a particular variety of dark ambient, "isolationism" (honestly, I'm not even sure what that means), it features many of the biggest names and it's an excellent start to get into it. There are tunes that lean more towards industrial or dark dub, though, so better to avoid it if you don't like those.

Also, Final have two live albums that are currently available for free download:
https://final1.bandcamp.com/
For those who don't know, Final is one of the countless side-projects of Justin Broadrick of Godflesh.

I only managed to finally find Benevolence not long ago. I wonder if there are lesser known artists exploring this particular approach.

I tried to get an ogg format version of the soundtrack to play in the game a long time ago and it didn't work. So then I actually ended up burning the ogg files onto a CD so that I could hear the music in-game! Of course, track 1 had to be empty, because on the original game CD (which will play in a CD player), the first track was an empty track containing data.

That should do it . But it always worked for me without the CD; it's a bit tricky, and different source ports may support different formats, but either mp3 or ogg worked for me. There's plenty of guides about how to do it; you just have to be careful about folders and file names etc.
Sorry for the off-topic foray but that game and that soundtrack is just the epitome of evil and creepy, it's unnerving that the music isn't included in any digital version.

good call on the isolationism comp. Deutsch Nepal is awesome - I have a signed copy of Benevolence here somewhere. In fact according to discogs I own about two thirds of CMIs output. One day I'll complete that project.

I suppose I'll throw in a mention of the Nether and End portions of C418's Minecraft soundtrack.

The Nether part is dark, with lots of roomy percussion and deep whooshing noises, but there's always a bit of melody in there. It counters the eerie elements nicely, making a sort of sad sound.

The End part is just creepy. It starts out with a recognizable theme from the soundtrack, then it becomes distorted, makes a loud glitch like an audio driver crashing, and goes into 15 minutes of a 1-note drone while distorted versions of other themes from the soundtrack play in the background.

The Superb Dreamerion will not disappoint

Drang is a good sport too
https://drang.bandcamp.com/

Nostromo by SleepResearch_Facility. It is based on the spaceship itself with the tracks separated as Decks, and it's an outstanding piece of atmosphere. Definitely recommended if you like Alien, System Shock, and similar sci-fi/horror.
https://coldspring.bandcamp.com/album/nostromo-csr34cd



Also plugging my own stuff. This project was based on the idea of a supernatural island.

Yeah, I've heard several of their albums. Not quite in my top tier, but still pretty enjoyable and atmospheric.

I'm going to plug a local(ish) project that I enjoy. Here's Gridfailure, an industrial/dark ambient project that actually played live at a dive bar here with just the main dude screaming into two mics through a pedal board with some background fuzz. I was actually intrigued enough that I actually looked him up. The project is themed around society's failures and societal collapse and it's rather haunting at times. Later he dabbles in death industrial, but my favorite remains the project's first album Ensuring the Bloodline Ends Here.

https://gridfailure.bandcamp.com/album/ ... -ends-here

There was a period in my life when ambient/dark industrial was about 90% of what I listened to. Just letting it roll over me in waves, drifting in and out, dreamlike and ethereal, even the nightmarish stuff. If you've ever been stuck outside hopelessly freezing and you start to fall asleep and just die but it still somehow keep you interested...yeah, like that. Looking through my post history for "ambient" and "ambience" and like terms, I've posted a lot about this shit, including some already mentioned in this thread...


It's not pure ambient but Ulf Söderberg: Tidvatten is my favorite album, of any genre. It's about 2/3rd's ambience, 1/3rd tribal "ambience" (ie tribal drumming over an ambient soundscape). Broad mixture of field recordings, instrumentation (drums and wind instruments), and synthesizers. Really almost everything Ulf has done is great but this one is my favorite.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUomTOfaMbQ

Robert Rich has done a lot of things---makes his own wind instruments, electronic drone, etc.---but he started his career off doing "sleep concerts" designed to help people sleep, and the attendees brought sleeping bags to do just that. More active in the beginning, got slower over the night, then ramped up in the 7th or 8th hour to get people ready for donuts. Anyway, he later did two night-length albums in that stye, a seven-hour audio DVD (Somniumand an 8-hour audio Blu-ray (Perpetual). Obviously, this isn't exactly active listening for the most part, but the last 40 minutes or so is more on the active side. I absolutely adore the last 30 minutes of Perpetual; I think it could stay on a permanent loop for years in my apartment and I would never tire of it.

https://youtu.be/sNwukK7Y8wQ?t=26627

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ld5uEuA0Fg&t=2s



An old favorite of mine, and of rexxz: Blood Box. No words needed, just an anxious universe trembling and moaning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXJ1kl- ... e=emb_logo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJmSO34 ... e=emb_logo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdmjt4hY2eI

Man, I've got to read through this thread because I know almost none of this stuff.

I guess Perturbator and synthwave/retro-synth is a different style, but it seems somewhat related, and I've gotten to like them a lot lately.

Then there's also bands like X-Fusion who I like and Psyclon 9 who I don't know that well but who are pretty good, and I'm assuming that Infected Mushroom is a different style altogether but i like them.

And this kind of thread always makes me think of bands like Axis of Perdition, Gnaw Their Tongues, Terra Tenebrosa and even to some extent old synth prog like Goblin, though i think none of those bands are probably of this same style really either.

I don't really know the difference between a lot of electronic music genres and have always meant to get more into this stuff so I'm going to follow this thread.

If anyone wants to explain to me the differences between dark ambient and some of these other electronic music genres feel free lol.

Since dungeon synth was mentioned earlier-- I'm a pretty big fan of Til Det Bergens Skyggene. They do a great job of evoking a really desolate, ancient, mystical vibe without leaning too hard into the corniness that tends to characterize dungeon synth (not that there's anything wrong with a dash of corniness, especially with a genre like dungeon synth).

Ulf Söderberg is also the guy behind the Sephiroth project that released two albums. Awesome stuff

https://youtu.be/OagjQhtgaws

My favorite new wave of dungeon synth is far and away Thangorodrim, particularly the albums Taur-nu-Fuin and Gil​-​Estel, both of which I could listen to endlessly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lpf-nQFzJ4

Speaking of dungeon synth I may or may not have something coming in the genre...

I'd be stoked to hear it. I'm always scrounging through the Dungeon Synth Archives youtube channel to find new shit. Most of it's meh, but there's quite a lot of decent stuff out there as well, and honestly I'm pretty easily pleased. What's your stuff sound like?

Thangorodrim - Taur-nu-Fuin, is my all time favorite Dungeon Synth album. I have listened to it over and over.

In the world of Dungeon Synth I also really like Mournful Moon - As Shadows Fall Over Zenitheaen, Arcana Liturgia - Tales of an Ancient World and Dwarrowdelf - From Beneath the Fells.

I am a very big fan of this style music and there quite a few releases that I listen to regularly.

https://cryochamber.bandcamp.com/

I can't recommend this label highly enough.

Flowers For Bodysnatchers, Lesa Listvy ('Unheard Of' might be my favourite album this year), the Ruptured World trilogy, Mount Shrine (chiiiillllll), all great stuff. It's nice to see a label that still puts effort into their physical copies.

I picked this up last Bandcamp Friday

Chiang Valley Liberators - And Then Everything Changed

https://corrosivegrowthindustries.bandcamp.com/album/and-then-everything-changed

The song 'Summary in the Dark' had been on the latest Zero Tolerance cover disc - wasn't disappointed with the album, it's a field-recordings/soundscape/ambient/touch of industrial joy.

The Cthulhu Mythos collaborations are essential listening imo.