Vidna Obmana

Artist: Alio Die + Dirk Serries (Vidna Obmana)
P:  2022
The chapters of the eclipse is the new musical union of Italy's Alio Die (Stefano Musso) and Belgium's Dirk Serries (vidnaObmana) which, more than twenty years after their previous collaboration contains three compositions in a suspended airy, majestic succession. The meditative and minimalist electronic ambient sky is suspended at the interval for liberation from the shadows of becoming: life in its most essential orientation.

Artist: Dirk Serries
P: 2013
Dirk Serries, the legendary Belgian genius behind vidnaObmana and Fear Falls Burning projects, celebrates here another chapter of his challenging "Microphonics" efforts. After the conclusion of previously mentioned projects, Dirk keeps on his journey to the boundaries of uncharted sonic terrains, a territory fusing all his long time musical experiences, visions and virtuosities. "Microphonics XXI-XXV" CD, a follow up to Dirk's debut "Microphonics I-V" from the end 2008, was released by Dutch Tonefloat Records in the middle of March, 2013 and it comes in attractive mini album gatefold sleeve featuring stunning urban pictures by Martina Verhoeven, Dirk's wife. Mastered by James Plotkin.
The opener, "Mounting Among The Waves" unfolds with quite harsh guitar dissonances, although minimally sculpted, the sound palette is quite wide, where intensely emerging passages of noise perplexes blend with floating backgrounds. The piece gradually build and steadily increase into powerfully immense sonic sceneries of utterly deep evocativeness. Even if having throughout its slightly ear-splitting surface, these peaking drones develop into a stunningly visualizing movements filled with sheer beauty and poignancy. Elegiac strings invade "There's A Light In Vein", but this melancholic stillness is soon intermingled on the background with slowly evolving panoramic textures, expanding by every second in its intensity and monstrousness. Ultra thick guitar dronescapes reach full bloom and paint genuinely magnificent and harmonious canvas, where unforgettable memories of vidnaObmana are awaken... This composition is a huge milestone melting the most magical moments of both, vidnaObmana and Fear Falls Burning, with Dirk's most recent harmonic desolations, a brightly shinning kaleidoscope of sounds, sensitiveness and reminiscences, an emotional powerhouse gratifying the listener's soul!!! "There's A Light In Vein" will counterpart any of the most famous vidnaObmana compositions, guitar drone manipulations have never sounded better!!! Thank you so much, Maestro, for this truly unique listening delight!!! "The Burden Of Hope" is announced by rawer riffs, again its shape sounds rather minimal, especially during the first three minutes, but always effective. The background drone blanket slowly enlarges into thicker volume and fully blossom into another breathtaking wide-screen scenario, melting rougher tensities with weighty dose of expansive drone roars and streams into one, monumentally monolithic sculpture, gloriously encircling and stimulating. Certainly another phenomenal piece in this set!!! "Thousands Of Rivers" relieves the tension a bit, although keeping its harsh edge, again masterfully intertwined with warmly gliding cloudscapes. Beautifully disturbing!!!
Yes, I am still deeply missing vidnaObmana, and always will, but with this album Dirk Serries has accomplished another huge step in his musical explorations. "Microphonics XXI-XXV" is a triumphant piece of art displaying extraordinary emotional sonorousness and invites each devoted listener to the frontier of intriguing guitar drone wizardry!!! And by the way, "Low Volume Music 2" with his long time traveler Steve Roach is the works too...

Richard Gürtler (Jun 02, 2013, Bratislava, Slovakia)

Artist: Fear Falls Burning
P: 2005
The debut release from Fear Falls Burning... vidnaObmana reinvents himself within this new persona. Fascinated by the extreme tonalities the electric guitar can produce, vidnaObmana transformed himself into Fear Falls Burning in order to record this debut album.
"he spoke in dead tongues" is truly an amazing statement in tone and harmony, centered around the real-time performances on the electric guitar. Through the unique wiring of the guitar pedal effects, its single performed guitarchord multiplies and shifts over time into dense and trance-inducing walls of sound. A spectrum of sound that sounds deliberately old and monotonous in reference to the vintage and replica effects. All clicks, ticks and cracks are part of the real-time performance.
With this double album on Projekt/Ikon Fear Falls Burning succeeds in performing a new language in music that cleverly delves into that fine musical line where lo-fi, instrumental post-rock, avant-garde, experimental and industrial meet...
A willful crossing between the infinite looping on Fripp&Eno's "No Pussyfooting" and the power chords of Sunn O.
This double CD solidifies Fear Falls Burning's willful vision in guitar drone music. In comparison to Fear Falls Burning's unofficial tour CD, First by a whisper, then by a storm, he spoke in dead tongues tells the complete story - way better balanced and sequenced but equally bold and unique.

Artist: Fear Falls Burning
P: 2006
DVD-Audio
LTD 500
Fear Falls Burning is Dirk Serries’ love letter to the world of electric guitar drones. Serries, best known for his solo act VidnaObmana, launched Fear Falls Burning in the winter of 2005 as an outlet for his fascination with lo-fi and post-rock music, and as a way to return to his roots in drone music, where he first began 22 years ago. By processing the sounds of his Les Paul guitars through a large and elaborately configured collection effects pedals, Serries produces improvisational music that is by turns meditative, rhythmic and occasionally thunderous. A typical performance begins with a simple, sustained guitar chord. This opening sound seeds the ground from which the entire piece is grown. As the looping and processing techniques are applied, the music evolves, dictating the direction of the performance. It is truly an improvisational process, but at the masterful hands of Serries, one that spins a new and mysterious kind of music, fully infused with a rare passion and soul. Organic variations and imperfections are spontaneously introduced, giving the performance a rich hue of unpredictability. Looped patterns of sound rise and fall, mutated by a succession of real-time treatments. This improvisational technique is the defining characteristic of Fear Falls Burning. In the spring of 2005, and again in the autumn of the same year, Serries took Fear Falls Burning on tour, performing in Germany, The Netherlands and Belgium. The shows were all recorded, and the best performances were chosen for release. Originally envisioned as a boxed set of six CDs, “The Infinite Sea of Sustain” morphed into a single DVD containing more than 4-1/2 hours of music. Each of the six performances is a single, uninterrupted improvisational composition, accompanied on screen by an abstract live photograph from the concerts; these are not music videos, and there is no motion picture footage. It’s all about taking advantage of the DVD format as a more cost-conscious and convenient way of presenting the music, and it plays in any standard DVD player. For best sound we recommend playback through a stereo sound system. An on-screen menu allows listeners to play the entire collection or choose individual concerts, but the use of a television is optional.
 

Artist: Steve Roach & Byron Metcalf
P: 2000   
Ambient explorer Roach and percussionist Metcalf originally began this as an experiment into the effects of breathwork and the use of sound on a person "as a shamanic strategy for healing, personal growth, and transformation." The successful effects their music had in group settings were extended into these compositions. While billed as a collaboration between the two men, The Serpent's Lair also features contributions by (deep breath) violinist Vicki Richards, overtone vocalist Jim Cole, pre-Hispanic sound sorcerer Jorge Reyes, singer Lena Stevens, synthesist Vidna Obmana, "groove alchemist" Vir Unis, and djembe players Jeffrey Fayman and Momodu "Mohammad" Kah. The two discs in this package act as yin and yang--the eight parts of the first disc, "The Serpent's Lair," highlight intoxicatingly hypnotic drum rhythms slicing through churning ambient spaces, while the seven cuts that make up the second disc, "Offerings from the Underworld," travel down darker, spacier streams with subtle rhythms, reverberant vocals, and exotic aerophones caressing and riding the ethereal aural waves. This invigorating combination of musicians invents a dynamic new perspective on Roach's trademark deep-listening forays. It would be wonderful to hear more collaborations like this.
All music arranged, mixed, melted and recorded by Steve Roach at the Timeroom Studio, Tucson AZ. 1999 - 2000
Music produced by Steve Roach and Byron Metcalf.

With musical help from:
Vicki Richards - serpentine violin in The Lair
Lena Stevens - processed voice
Vidna Obmana - harmonic wave in pt. I in Rite Of Passage.
Jeffery Faymanand Momodu "Mohammad" Kah - djembe in Rite Of Passage, Big Medicine and Future Tribe
Jorge Reyes - voice, flutes, ocarinas, whistles, shamanic percussion and voice in Birthright and Cave Dwellers
Vir Unis - groove alchemy in Beating Hearth Of The Dragon Mother and Lena - voice in Ochua

Artist: Steve Roach & Vidna Obmana
P: 2012    
After a ten year hiatus, Steve Roach and Dirk Serries (formerly recording as vidnaObmana or Vidna Obmana) reconnect to begin anew. The result is LOW VOLUME MUSIC, an introspective musical palette solely dedicated to harmony, integrity and pure beauty.
In a world where the noise level of daily life has increased to a fever pitch, this release offers an essential sonic respite from the external distractions. These five delicate sound meditations appear in the listening space like slowly drifting incense. The pieces are built upon a perfect blend of deep ambient characteristics: looping and lush textures and harmonics mixed with subtle, hovering, lattice-like forms. The tracks follow a zen-like flow, bringing the listener's attention down to a distinct stillness, a single point; gently shifting, sparkling mirror pools of sound are revealed as meditations to reflect upon. The understated beauty of LOW VOLUME MUSIC offers a path back to the soulful nourishment found at the quiet center.
"We chose the title LOW VOLUME MUSIC," Dirk reflects, "because we wanted to score an album of pure minimalism, introspection and harmony; music that is most effective at a lower volume. Although it draws from our personal and mutual universe of sound, I believe the biggest difference from the past is we both wanted to aim for something unclouded without pushing each other to break sonic boundaries. We both felt it was vital for us personally to express that part of us that we return to: the pure, harmonically-nuanced side of our art that we naturally live and breathe."
Over the course of their six releases and many international concerts, Roach and Serries pushed the edges of ambient electronic music, then when the time felt right they respectfully stepped away to pursue other work. With LOW VOLUME MUSIC, Roach and Serries reconnect to create a beautiful release, displaying a vision sublimely refined, minimal, and true. This is perhaps their most personal collaboration to date.

Artist: Steve Roach & Vidna Obmana
P: 1997    
On their collaboration, Cavern of Sirens, Roach and Obmana uncover yet another level of artistry within their shared passion for un compromised sound worlds. The result is at once alluring and focused, fusing the duo's continuously evolving signature of trance-percussion and rich harmonic textures that defy any sense of known location or origin. The release gathers four stirring pieces which lead to a final harmonic reflection which suggests what's in store on their next project, already in the works. Cavern of Sirens encompasses nearly 74 minutes of music presented in an elegant booklet featuring the organic visions of Belgian photographer Martine Verhoeven. Stepping outside a world obsessed with categorizing every fragment of experience, Roach and Obmana explore subtle shades of nuance that words cannot touch. Together, they bring to life insights and apparitions that can only be charted by those willing to ride the lush and treacherous sound currents spiraling ever deeper through the Cavern of Sirens.

Artist: Steve Roach & Vidna Obmana 
P: 2000    
LTD 1000
This enhanced CD unites Martina Verhoeven's photography (seen on the CAVERN OF SIRENS cover) with an exclusive soundtrack by Vidna Obmana & Steve Roach, and Linda Kohanov's intense and breathtaking poetry. The audio portion, 60 minutes long, plays on any CD player, while the multimedia presentation requires a Windows PC. (Mac users can use Virtual PC from Connectix.)
Dark music with effect to the pictures.

Here the last copy.

Artist: Steve Roach & Vidna Obmana
P: 2002    
Surrealist soundsculptures Steve Roach and Vidna Obmana return with InnerZone, their first new collaborative work since 1999's quickly sold-out limited edition box set Ascension of Shadows. Venturing off safe and well travelled roads, the duo step into a chilling and beautifully haunted realm of shapeshifting soundscapes mixed with fascinating rythmic forms. This compelling release reminds the listener why Roach/Obmana are the masters of atmospheric electronic music. An unusual combination of acoustic and electronic instruments expands the zones of their previous CDs together. Vidna Obmana's fujara, a Hungarian overtone flute, weaves with Roach's ultra-textural and expansive guitar zones to create a hybrid electro-acoustic mix. On InnerZone, the final merging of surreal acoustic, electronic elements and deep “inner” rhythms present an ambiguous and at the same time inviting space to visit; taking the duo to the next level of their collaborative work.
 

Artist: Steve Roach & Vidna Obmana 
P: 2005   
First released as a limited edition of 2000 in 1998, the 3-CD box set Ascension Of Shadows quickly sold out, and has remained a highly-desired prize for Roach and Obmana fans.
The first release in the series is the long-form piece "Somewhere Else". This track is without doubt among the most serene, purely atmospheric and non-threatening of Roach and Obmana's recorded work together, and was originally presented in the Ascension Of Shadows 3-CD box set, which was subtitled "Meditations For the Millennium".
The intentions for creating a place of solace for what the artists were sensing, with the approaching anticipation of the year 2000 and beyond, feels especially potent and nourishing when heard now.