Syndrome – Now And Forever

The beauty of the bleak, the stars of a shadowed narrative…

In a recently emerged video to accompany Syndrome’s 28 minute, one track release – an astonishing piece of work that combines the desolate slow burn with a strange sense of euphoria – themes are explored without ever taking centre stage… a montage flows loosely but with determination.

Syndrome is an alias of Mathieu Vandekerckhove, member of post-metal band Amenra, in which he crafts deeply introspective soundscapes – this particular piece was written for his son Wolf – and thanks to Belgian label ConSouling Sounds, ‘Now And Forever’ has gained a CD release. The video offers a vast sequence of lives, situations and locations, entwined and brought together in unsettling but gracefully subtle shades of grey.

Filmakers Tine Guns & Sander Vandenbroucke let things unfold at a pace that rarely exceeds the dreamy, and in doing so allow a silent drama to creep out at the whim of the viewer. A sense of freedom to extract whatever combination of serenity, intensity and poetry is there, and with the brooding, beautiful post-rock infused ambience gently burning and shimmering in your ears, the whole thing is a very dreamlike affair indeed.

Patience and a kind of wisened approach to gloom and rapture run throughout both the music and the film, and in doing so create a moving and deeply affecting whole.

The ConSouling Sounds release page which contains further information and purchasing links can be found here.

- Daniel Mackenzie for Fluid Radio

Video by Tine Guns & Sander Vandenbroucke

www.consouling.be
www.mathieu-vandekerckhove.tumblr.com