Label: self released
Band: Walden
Origin: Germany

“Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Danijel Zambo must have had clear reasons for naming this project after the famed book by the American author Thoreau. A hankering for solitude in nature is definitely something you can feel throughout the music of this record. The third release actually, by this musician.

The goal of this project is to create music that evokes ideas and emotions through referencing nature. As inspirations are also cited bands like Ulver and Empyrium, which is tangible in the dark folk sound that Walden produces. So time to immerse ourselves in the solitude of this Augsburg artist.

Walden is minimal guitar play, more expressive and impulsive than really creating songs, over mild ambient tones and the reverberation of the lower tones. It’s the sound of a lonely musician, enjoying the instrument without the need for song structures and complexities. Merely plucking the strings in  an absent state and pondering life, enjoying the feeling of creating casual sounds.

Ofcourse not all of the record is like that, but most of it does hold to that feeling. On ‘Rad Der Zeit’ we can even enjoy an oriental bit of play, with precious precision. But most of the album is like the album cover, a smooth sunset that takes its own time in emerging. Letting go of time and other urgencies, just being and becoming regardless of human influences. It’s finding harmony within itself, that makes this EP so powerful and touching to listen to. A search for tranquility through music, by letting it flow freely.

Normally I just share the recent album, but I’d like you to check the covers that Walden did too here, so here goes. Particularly ‘The Rains of Castamere’.