Journey to an Ancient Celtic Past with Caldon Glover

Caldon Glover presents the debut album on the Cryo Chamber roster, Ùir, a haunting, imposing journey into Celtic tribes and mysticism from a pre-Roman era. A newcomer to the roster, sure, but Caldon Glover immediately stands apart with this new release, whose tracks intimate worlds and dimensions forgotten to time and lost in the haze of our past, forgotten, and only vaguely whispered of through hint and subtle muse.

Beginning in the first track, a deep drum pounds into the silence, followed by a throat-sung note sustained into the emptiness, and Ùir begins to slowly unfurl, giving an immediate tribal timbre to the presentation. Slow drones of single pad resound, passing by into the space created by the mix. These are sounds that echo to the listener from beyond the veil of time, and the album does an excellent job of presenting this aesthetic, as if the listener were in a trance, and hearing fleeting remembrances of notes and stanzas in the transom of forgotten history. There is a primal, tribal element and aesthetic that permeates the entirety of the album - stylings that are similar in presentation to one of this author’s personal favorite albums, Advent, by Randal Collier-Ford, or even the haunting album of Norse mysticism, Niflheim, by Ager Sonus, fans of those albums will definitely find something to like about Caldon Glover, who composed all music and even provided the throat singing. All of the tracks on the album are titled using an ancient tongue, Scots-Gaelic seems to be a recurring term via internet search, however this author will admit to pure ignorance on the entire subject, leaving much of the album to mystery.

This is a strong entry from a new addition to the Cryo Chamber roster, and one of this author’s personal favorites of the year. The cover art perfectly captures the aesthetic presentation of this album, an imposing, mysterious journey into ancient, perhaps even antediluvian mystical histories of a people lost to time. Ùir can be purchased in CD Digipak and digital formats on the Cryo Chamber bandcamp page.