Bell Witch and Aerial Ruin announce collaborative album ‘Stygian Bough Volume 1’

May 5, 2020 James Weaver

BELL WITCH and AERIAL RUIN have announced a new collaborative album!

Titled Stygian Bough Volume 1, the upcoming album sees renown doom duo BELL WITCH collaborate with dark folk elegist AERIAL RUIN. The album will be released in June this year, via Profound Lore.

AERIAL RUIN‘s Erik Moggridge has been a part of BELL WITCH‘s sonic fingerprint on all their prior records, perhaps most notably for his vocals on their previous acclaimed full-length, Mirror Reaper. He’s now part of the very fabric that makes up the five, emotional and strikingly heavy songs that comprise Stygian Bough Volume 1.

The upcoming album was recorded and mixed by Randall Dunn at Avast Recording Co. in Seattle. BELL WITCH and AERIAL RUIN then took the full-length to mastering ace Bob Weston at Chicago Mastering Service in Chicago. The result is a full-length of profound lows and delicate highs – fitting for the two band’s quiet/introspective and heavy/loud dynamic.

“Stygian Bough is a reference to the theme of The Golden Bough,” observes BELL WITCH‘s Dylan Desmond. “The book’s theme is centered on the rites of a temple in ancient Italy where slaves were transformed into kings by slaying he who reigned as such after successfully stealing the Golden Bough from the sacred tree within the temple. Within that notion, a different sort of slavery was brought upon the newly crowned king, as he must understand sooner or later that his fate would ultimately be the same as his predecessor. In short, the golden bough made a king out of a slave only to find they were now enslaved to a different sort of tyranny, always stalking them from the darkest shadows of their imagination. From this perspective, the “golden bough” is better understood as a deception casting darkness. Thus, Stygian Bough.”

AERIAL RUIN‘s Erik Moggridge adds, “they presented that song [Rows (of Endless Waves)] to me in a mostly instrumental form with the idea that it’s about a ghost trapped on rows of waves that can’t reach the land. I ran with this idea and started to think of the ghost of a king who, if he reached land could be reborn and rule again. The king is also a larger metaphor for humanity who rules over the planet and other species. On this new album our ghost upon the waves flees not towards the land but towards death. The narrative, as much as it exists, is loose and not linear and definitely stream of consciousness. There are cyclical and spherical qualities to the journey where death, desolation, and the spirit are reflected in myriad ways.”

Alongside the announcement of the new collaboration, the bands have released the first song from the upcoming record; Heaven Torn Low II (the toll).

Listen to Heaven Torn Low II (the toll) here: