#AlbumReview: Old Tower – Dark Music
Artist: Old Tower
Album: Dark Music
Label: Hospital Productions
Release date: November 05th, 2026
Country: Netherlands
Format reviewed: High-quality digital recording
#AlbumReview: Old Tower – Dark Music via Hospital Productions by Ioana
Continuing down the path of rediscovering and finally taking my time with music I discovered by chance a while ago, the next stop seems to be the dungeon synth/ ambient project Old Tower. This musical venture first became better known in underground music circles through the 2017 album, The Rise of the Spectre, and ever since then, a stream of releases has been flowing constantly from under the name Old Tower. Fast forward to the summer of 2025, a time during which I was diving into dungeon synth seriously for the first time, I remember giving a brief listen to The Rise of the Spectre, but not with the seriousness which the album deserved. This brings us to the present, when, as I was searching for an album to write about, I ended up coming across an image of the album cover of Dark Music, and, perhaps a combination of the color palette and the mood of the image, as well as me finding the name of the project familiar, made me pause. That was when, without having even listened to the album yet, I knew it was what I wanted to sit with and write about. As of right now, I can say for certain it was the right call. And probably an indication to add Old Tower to the ever growing list of projects I wish to listen to in a comprehensive manner.
To start, I wouldn’t necessarily describe Dark Musicas a “dungeon synth” album. And it seems, as per the artist’s description of “four immersive soundscapes in which acoustic earth meets other-world electronics in quiet symbiosis”, works in the favour of said statement. At the same time, the term “dark ambient” doesn’t fit perfectly either, but it is the most straightforward categorization at hand. All that being said, there are many records which, as is the case of Dark Music, resist any attempts at neat labeling, most likely though, for the best. But leaving aside the subgenre debate, the album at hand is nothing short of a mesmerizing listen, in the sense that it feels like the soundtrack of a story from which there are certain elements missing, or have been forgotten. It feels, simply put, as if it sits on the verge of memory and dream. Can that simply be called the musical embodiment of a hypnagogic image? Probably yes.
Returning to the artist statement, however, the term which stands out the most to me is “symbiosis”, because it encapsulates perfectly the dynamic between the musical elements displayed on Dark Music. The second track of the album, “Where has the Spirit Gone” exemplifies this through its use of faint choral samples, acoustic guitar and cello textures, as well as various types of dungeon synth adjacent passages, all bound together through layers of textures and ambiance which make everything sound as if it fades in and out of focus. As per the “hypnagogic image” metaphor in the opening part of this review, there are moments, particularly in the second half of the song, which reminded me of the sensation of losing awareness of your surroundings as you fall asleep. This type of mood is persistent throughout the entirety of Dark Music, but, for example, on “Sorrow Betwixt Whistling Oaks’, it comes off much more rooted into a specific type of setting, because of the better defined and more rhythmic use of the choir samples, for one. Speaking of the choir samples, all of them seem to be taken from liturgical music, my closest guess would be catholic Mass music, but, when placed alongside everything else, it loses its specificity and becomes more of a shorthand for a sense of “there’s something liminal about this setting”. A comparison that comes to mind is that of symbolist and surrealist art, currents in which spirituality and dream-like or mythological imagery come together to form something entirely new, and perhaps, far better rooted in the darker aspects of the mind than other forms of art.
As a closing thought, I wanted to take the moment to state that I did not expect this album to get under my skin the way it did. As someone who is rather prone to introspection, and often attempt to visualize different aspects of my mind in different forms, this album feels strangely close to whatever I end up conjuring in these scenarios. It is dark and solemn, yes, but I found it to provide a strangely comforting and almost intimate listening experience. I will likely spend many evenings in its company, and I am looking forward to that. 9.5/10
Band
Instagram
Bandcamp
Deezer
Spotify
9.5/10 Epic Storm
**Please support the underground! It’s vital to the future of our genre**
#WeAreBlessedAltarZine
#TheZineSupportingTheUnderground
