Lanterns in the Night: Celebrating Five Issues of The Dark Corner
We last took a look into the world of The Dark Corner at issue number one and two, the inaugural offerings of dark and arcane dispatches from the woods of South Carolina. Since then, society shattering pandemics be damned, the amateur magazine has trudged on through the night and we now arrive at a triumphant fifth issue with a sixth on the horizon. Issue five conjures ten tales from an eclectic selection of creators, ranging from lonesome voyages into haunted seas to portentous visions of futures that feel uncomfortably close. Come, stare into the dark with me, and let me tell you what I see.
Three stories here immediately stand out to me as ruminations on our modern world, each developing possible reactions to the way we live and how we choose to confront problems as a society. In our opening tale, Mark Allan Gunnells’ “The Book Hunter”, we dive into the mind of a character obsessed by a perceived “dumbing down” of the modern populace by reality television and politics. They’ve made it their mission to hunt and punish anyone who they see as anti-intellectual, anyone too dimwitted or dull to just read a goddamn book. This story seems to be as much of a damnation and satire of the kind of mind who inspired this anti-hero as it is of the victims themselves. A mean little critique of the opiated masses and the self-righteous egotists who rail against them. Later in this volume we find a pair of stories that seem at least partially inspired by the immediate future. In Benji Osias’ “The Last Skater” we see a future where the struggle of existing in the outside world has driven mankind into an inward existence, bound to wheelchairs, fed mood altering drugs from their walls, and constantly jacked into a fantasy world of virtual reality. This story was particularly engaging for its attention to detail and respect for its driving set-piece, skateboarding history. Juxtaposed to this possible eventuality of self imposed, crippling safety we find Kit Gower’s short piece “Pod”. Kit relates, through a series of journal entries, a husband and wife’s descent into protective bunkers as a pandemic, an all too familiar plot device to those of us living in 2021, threatens America. I found “The Last Skater” to be the strongest of these stories with it’s clear and anecdotal ideas about what we risk becoming if the digital world becomes too tempting and safe.
Next, lets take a look at some of the more traditional horror pieces chosen for this volume. Chris Pluska delights with “The Sea Priest”, a cold, foreboding tale of disappearing seamen and haunted, drifting vessels. A man takes a final ride in his late father’s fishing boat off the Japanese coast and becomes trapped in a dance with a dark shadow of marine folklore. My favorite piece from this collection is Gabrielle Zurlo’s “Keep”. This is the story of a mother and daughter trying to find stability and roots in a new town when a sinister presence suddenly makes it’s home in the middle of their lives. This is exactly the kind of quiet, understated horror I always hope to find when I pick up any anthology or magazine. Zurlo’s prose is unsettling and minimal, making for a nice, lean cut of atmospheric horror.
The last couple of stories I want to talk about are the two that close this issue. I was particularly wrapped up in Marc Coignard’s dreamlike journey across the desert in “No One Calls The High Desert Home”. This fable-like story of the wild west is so reminiscent of watching classic Twilight Zone re-runs that I would believe it came from Roger Sterling’s pen. This author gets a high recommendation from me. Even as this issue closed I was pleasantly surprised by Robin Flower’s tight, economic action in “Ictineo”, an alternate history adventure about the pioneering inventor of one of the first submarines and his socialist cohorts. This was a truly inspiring piece of pulp writing that begs for continuation and expansion. Lets hope we see more from Robin soon.
So, how is this little gem of speculative fiction faring five issues deep into its nocturnal journey? The Dark Corner seems to be going strong and attracting amateur material of ever increasing quality. I had a huge amount of joy devouring every piece in this issue and I can’t recommend this enough. Be on the lookout soon for pre-orders launching on issue number six for god’s sake pick up some back issues and digital copies. Keep The Dark Corner strong and keep it weird.
You can find new and previous issues of The Dark Corner at: https://thedarkcornerzine.limitedrun.com/
Industrial pulses that blend into an organic bed texture… with its kinetic analog pounding gives a martial feel to the ethereal pads, and each subsequent track helps to construct this environment in the listener’s mind; this subterranean refuge of machinery constantly thrumming in the background of these caverns and grottoes of the sanctuary.
Usually… we, the listeners, are treated to sinister drones and barely audible stabs and percussions… Crypthios refreshingly changes this paradigm with Vestigium, and rather than bestowing us with tenebrous wind and descanted, reverbed field recordings, we are treated with gentle, meandering pads and more introspective, organic notes.
This is a chiptune dungeon synth romp which propels you through the environment, while the underlying layers of strings and synths keep you well-grounded in the dungeon synth atmosphere. The tracks consist of melodies and sounds that merge between aggressive and mysterious, to lighter-hearted fare of gentle and passive tones.
The industrial elements are nearly ever-present within the confines of the music, which is to be expected considering the persons involved, but the rhythms are subdued and carefully guided, never allowing the atmosphere to be broken. In all, this is an excellent, atmospheric sci-fi journey
Six demigods of old are represented in this collection, with some familiar names, and some unknown, but the names of the composers on this album should not be unfamiliar, and for those who may be new to the dark ambient scene, or who have not heard the artists involved in this collection, this is definitely an excellent starting point.
If an album’s title can be interpreted as a statement of artistic intent, then the confidence Watain have in this one is completely undeniable. The band themselves are setting this album up to be compared to the already ridiculously high watermark set by the trinity of Casus Luciferi, Sworn to the Dark and Lawless Darkness. I’m here to tell you that said confidence wasn’t even remotely unwarranted.
The easel of Metatron Omega is the canvas of eternity, and each song is a gentle wave of sound that caresses the consciousness further along the ebb of Time.
Composer Pierre LaPlace has delivered a bleak, immersive world not only of despair and violence, but also the intrepid and indomitable human spirit… Opening with speculative vocals pads, and tremulous string drones that foretell the audio diorama unfolding before your eyes, the movie of your mind begins to coalesce into establishing camera shots of vistas of warfare below, the crumbling ruins of near-future Rome below your field of view, embroiled in war.
This newest album takes us on a sojourn into the fantastical realm of dreams; into worlds and folds reality touched by faint memory, yet shaped by the subconscious, much the same way the music of Dead Melodies is presented.
ProtoU’s layered sound design approach carries us along the currents of subconscious languor, with narrative hints of computer-aided artificial enhancement, maybe even consciousness storage, but just as the doldrum science fiction precis implies, the hypnotic droning from ProtoU lulls us into a quiet sense of submission, and we merely waft with the eddies of the textured pads.
After five years the ring of salt around Yonkers, New York has been broken and the flames of hell are seeping back into a changed world. 2017 was the last time death metal four-piece Immolation cast their blistering curse on mortal ears.
Halloween is long over, and the new year has just begun, but sometimes our greatest fears found are in the little things we take for granted. We spoke with Osric Chau, star of the newly released Superhost, about making a film that combines the conventions of horror with a fresh scenario that speaks to the digital culture and physical isolation of the 2020s.
The listener will be guided through the cascades of imaginative synthscapes at a seemingly capricious gait, but Storonskyi is always in control… the exuberance of Klaus Schulze, but tampered with precision to the purpose of the atmosphere.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA — Dec 7, 2021 — A sharply satirical genre-bending journey through one absurdly terrifying dinner party in modern America, AN EXQUISITE MEAL is a darkly playful Buñuelian nightmare that’s full of punchlines and twists.
Los Angeles : IT meets THE BABADOOK in director Talal Selhami’s ACHOURA, now available on DVD and Digital from Dark Star Pictures.
Following raves at Cinepocalypse, Brussels Fantastic Film Festival, Bucheon Fantastic Film Festival and more, North America gets to now witness the terrifying tale of a Moroccan legend.
Issue five conjures ten tales from an eclectic selection of creators, ranging from lonesome voyages into haunted seas to portentous visions of futures that feel uncomfortably close. Come, stare into the dark with me, and let me tell you what I see.
Planetary Adventures, the newest release by DMR publishing, brings together five tales from the golden age of science fiction in the same vein of the legendary John Carter of Mars and Captain Future that will transport you on adventures to worlds from across the universe.
Everyone’s favorite Norwegian politician/postal service employee, Gylve “Fenriz” Nagell, and his ever-silent, ever-watchful supplier of friendship and dark money, Ted “Nocturno Culto” Skjellum, have managed to find time out of their busy schedules of campaigning, letter sorting and fundraising to grace our ears with another album from their little-known side project, DarkThrone.
God's Left Hand, Devil's Right Hand, translated from the Japanese Kami no Hidari-te Akuma no Migi-te, is an anthology of five interconnected stories all centered around Sou Yamanobe, a young school boy plagued by nightmares. And what nightmares they are.
Anthology Archeology is a new series here at M3 where I, your humble horror host, will guide you, the reader, through a smorgasbord of my personal favorite schlock. Not just any common cheese, mind you. I prefer a specific species - the short and sinister variety. The sort that slithered and seeped their way on to the bottom rack of the local video store and traversed their way into tape players by way of badass box-art and some eerie elbow grease
DMR Books has traveled to the far corners of the Million Spheres and brought together a new collection of rare and overlooked works from some of the greatest writers of the sword-and-sorcery and heroic fantasy genres in their newest volume, Renegade Swords II.
In British folklore, the Beast of Bodmin Moor, is a phantom wild cat rumored to live in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The Moor became a center of purported sightings after 1978, with occasional reports of slain and mutilated livestock
DMR has joined forces with one of the most talented writers in the fantasy genre today, John R Fultz, in order to release a new collection of works that stands as a monumental example of some of the best modern works in the sword-and-sorcery, dark, and heroic fantasy genres today.
Welcome back to Screentone Nightmares. Halloween is two days away and at this point I should be around 50 movies deep in my annual horror marathon. However, let’s carve out a bit of time for the printed page and take a look at another piece of Japanese terror.
…a multi-hued crawl of ambient textures, with constant beds of drones, meanwhile resonant pads of guitar pedal slowly ebb and meander in and among the cascading waves of the soundscapes.