Despondent Halls

[despondenthalls]

Hello,

I make dungeon synth music under the name Despondent Halls. This is my first time sharing any of my dungeon synth music online!

Influences include Nahadoth (the name of my project is a reference and tribute to a Nahadoth track), Blood Tower, and Onoskelis.

Two of the pieces were generated algorithmically using a program I wrote in Super Collider. These two pieces are my attempt at 12-tone Dungeon Synth. The rest were created in a more traditional manner.

Curious if this music catches fire with anyone here!

Link - despondenthalls.bandcamp.com

[thekeeper]

Really interesting release. Reminds me of old BC stuff a bit. Second track is wild. Hope to hear more.

Welcome to the forum!

[nahadoth]

Really great stuff. I think some of the folks here will really enjoy this, especially the more atonal tracks. I am, of course, honored by the tip of the hat. I want more people to hear this stuff!

[despondenthalls]

Thank you for listening and for the kind words! They inspired me to make another short recording. Here's the link - despondenthalls.bandcamp.com/album/the-wizard-enters-your-mind

Listening back, I thought the first recording was a bit all over the place. I restricted myself to using a single VST on this one. There's a heavy Mystal Tree influence on the second track!

[thekeeper]

I actually think this second one is more 'all over the place' than the first. I felt Nightmare Serpent had more consistency in its atmosphere and concept; there was a feeling of perplexity and unexpectedness throughout, kind of wondering what will come next, whether a track would bring in more drums, break off into a creepy synthesized voice, etc. I think the drums definitely carried the first EP. I suppose I can see how all that that be 'all over the place', but I did feel some semblance of consistency, even if dynamism & intrigue themselves made up that consistency as one concept.

This new EP has some interesting moments, but it seems more to be some experimental forays rather than a finished work. The tracks are quite different from each other, like the last one, but I think much more so where they seem disconnected. The Mystal Tree influence on the second track was pretty clear but the blast beat part seemed kind of forced, though I did like part where the drum pattern gradually grew out of and back into sync with the synth line. Percussive elements are a strong suit in both EPs. The free improv track here fit with the title, but for seemed less complete than Dreamt in the Catacombs did on the last EP, maybe because of sparse VST variety. I think there are some kool ideas at work, but it didn't seem whole. I think adding more texture, or some fiddling in post-production, might add more to it (if I can make a suggestion), add to the body.

[despondenthalls]

Thank you for taking the time to listen and comment! Thank you for noticing the phasing on the second track with the piano line gradually matching up with the drums. I'm a bit relieved someone noticed the blastbeats being too forced. I literally started the album thinking, "I can't let Mystal Tree be the only one indulging in blast beats!" Front loading one's intention in that way is a good way to shoot oneself in the foot artistically. Maybe a better metaphor would be painting oneself into a corner...

I actually worried while composing about the tracks being too rhythmically focused. There was a strong desire to try and be harmonically/melodically clever to draw attention away from my rhythmic crutch. When I used to write guitar lines for for death metal bands I played in, the lines would often be chromatic or atonal purely so I could focus on the rhythmic component. 

But noticing that you enjoyed that aspect of it makes me think I should be less shy about it when I compose. 

That might be something for me to consider moving forward with trying to fuse 12-tone composition and DS together as one (call it "compositional alchemy" to stick with the medieval theme?). If I apply rhythmic phasing, etc. to a tone row, it might be fruitful.

Oh, and actually the atonal track wasn't freely improvised! I love free improv, but I'm trying to avoid relying on that in anything I do with this project. The process used generating that piece was the most strict out of the whole thing. It uses the tone row and its retrograde.

Thank you for listening!

[Carl Shoemaker]

is it just me? or did this project vanish from band camp?

edit: it looks like the project's name was changed to buxton's kingdom with most of the old releases gone, a few new ones, but still that magpie one is still available.

[crystallogic13]

Reminds me when I was talking about when Elixir's stuff vanished (bought too, from your inventory vanished) a little while ago. He later on resurfaced and put all releases back on a new page and from a couple days ago he made them all NYP so at least even someone who bought them and hadn't grabbed them could get them. (Note: related to the drama another brother hinted at, after that Elixir didn't put "Dungeon Synth" as a tag on any of his releases).

Here it seems is a kind of similar story from what I saw after you mentioned it svenkid : Despondent Halls guy seems as you say to be renamed as Buxton's Kingdom, with no Dungeon Synth tag .. And the release lineup is different (EDIT: The Dungeon Keeper which I found nice stuff is renamed as "Potions", "Take it to the Skies.." is "The Wizard Enters Your mind" and I guess Nightmare Serpent maybe could be there too renamed or whatnot) . Good find, though, I want to check rest of his stuff. Btw what "magpie" release? There are 6 and no matching one!

[Carl Shoemaker]

I was referring the Phoebe, the elf mage warrior release. I didn't cross reference the albums and track times of tracks to see if they are the exact same, but it sounds reasonable.