Laurent Colson - Dark Celebration

While not much can be found online about Laurent Colson's history, what's important to know is that he is an electronic producer operating under witch house, gravewave, and other such related genres. His Bandcamp page shows that he has been an active music producer since 1991, as their first release is an archive of collected works from that time period. Under the name Lost Memories, Colson released the album "The Edge of Eternity" in 1999. It was not until 2018 that Colson released something new, a full-length album titled "Emptiness". Following that came "Temporal Land", another full-length released in 2020. 2021 sees Colson release arguably their most important and definitive work to date, "Dark Celebration". 

"Dark Celebration" is a thirteen track album written, produced, and recorded by Colson himself. Of course, he had a little bit of help along the way, with spoken word lyrics delivered by Hong Ji Woo and photography done by Evgeniia Litovchenko. What is the most interesting aspect about Colson is the fact that he does not use real vocals in his music. Instead, he synthetically produces them by using computer technology. They don't necessarily have meaning as the lyrics are delivered in an imaginary language. What this creates then is a dark and wicked witch house album that brings me to a gothic fantasy land. 



In regards to the music found on "Dark Celebration", you will not hear me complain. The music is quite stellar, with production high and quality following suit. I don't want to strut through each and every single song and give it praise, but I will point out four that hit all the right spots for me. This starts with the second track on the album, 'Damnation Of Love'. Piano chords and static act as the intro to the song as deep and crunchy bass slowly waddles into the song. At the forty second mark creeping synth lines make their presence known and are soon followed by the synthetic voice. Angelic and in line with the piece, they sound more like another instrument than they do lyrics in this case. Two thumbs up. 

In the middle of the album, Colson drops an ambient piece called 'The Prayers Of Sin'. While not the most intricate piece, what it does well is utilize multiple layers of light synths instead of dragging a single note over nearly four-minutes. Like samples are placed throughout the song as well to keep it fresh. I found it invigorating. Right after this piece is 'Archangel Masquerade' which looks to darkwave for inspiration. Still with darkly enticing dragging beats, there's an undeniable dance-rhythm to the song making it suitable for your next goth club night or DJ set. The final song I would like to point out is 'Persistent Attraction' which is a very slow but meticulously crafted dark electronic track. I appreciate every single experimental noise and beat found within and always look forward to 'Persistent Attraction' whenever I listen to "Dark Celebration". 

My biggest complaint about the album, however, lies within the synthesized vocals. As nice as the voice sounds, I think it would be wise to collaborate with vocalists for Colson's next release. There are times, such as on one of my favorite songs 'Persistent Attraction', where I wish cohesive lyrics were available to provide a deeper meaning to the track. In the independent electronic scene, it is not hard to get together with a couple of trained vocalists for a song, and with the amount of talent Colson has in his pocket, it should be easy enough finding others willing to lend their talent to his songs. It's not a major downer, but it is enough to become frustrating at times especially when the music is so damned good. 

"Dark Celebration" is exactly that; it's a festive party of all things gothic and electronic. Colson has a grand understanding of his chosen genre and that shows in his high production values and his ability to craft thirteen different tracks on one album. Again, I do complain about the gibberish lyrics and vocals, but I think he could easily avoid that by collaborating with a vocalist (or vocalists) in the future to avoid that problem. Nonetheless, this is an album that I could easily come back to over and over again as I have been in the past week. Altogether, I give "Dark Celebration" a seven out of ten. 

This review was commissioned through our Ko-fi page.
Jun 13 2021