This week's #ThursdayFiveList theme is giving me text adventure vibes. It's #360Degrees : songs that have any compass points or directions in them.
After three tracks that came to me all had a certain point in common, I followed through with the rest and have a concept list on my hands.
Please enjoy the expansive variety that is the oeuvre of electronic music giants, Ulver, with a particular (but not exclusive) emphasis on their drone electronica era (they're currently making anti-imperialist alt disco, which is also great, incidentally).
Ulver - True North
https://ulver.bandcamp.com/track/true-north
Coming in at over 16 minutes, this the kind of drone that you feel, that wraps your body, drags you under, and infests you with glorious sensation.
Ulver - Østenfor Sol Og Vestenfor Måne
https://ulverband.bandcamp.com/track/stenfor-sol-og-vestenfor-m-ne
Tender and dramatic acoustic folk with lovely choral vocals. This was the album that I discovered Ulver with.
"East of the sun and west of the moon
There you will arrive late or never
To the end of the world it goes"
Ulver - Southern Gothic
https://ulver.bandcamp.com/track/southern-gothic
Pulsating electronic soundscapes and Garm's disco-infused vocals feel like a vision of unborn future.
"I want to tell you something
About the grace of faded things"
Sunn O))) & Ulver - Western Horn
https://ulver.bandcamp.com/track/western-horn
The shades of spaghetti western soundtracks occupy the soundscapes of this collaboration, with distant jangling guitars, the implication of voices lost in the electronics, and a growing atmosphere of oppression.
Ulver - Enter The Void
https://ulver.bandcamp.com/track/enter-the-void
A little more ringing, melodic drone to finish off and leave you somewhere gentle and heart-wrenching as it collapses into organs and overdriven hauntings to seize you by the throat.
In keeping with my text adventure influenced reading of the theme, "enter" is here taken to be a direction.