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Losthilde // Fabula Sjuzhet (Remastered Edition)

by Stray Ghost

supported by
Dan Kletter
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Jack Deckard
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Francisco
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michael allenberg
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Steve Lake
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Scott Moore
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chris coote
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luceman
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Pattur23
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/
1.
There's an Ocean Between Us, You and I // Part One 29:24
2.
There's an Ocean Between Us, You and I // Part Two 12:15
3.
Saudade // Part One 17:05
4.
Saudade // Part Two 14:30
5.
Swans / Black (Fabula/Sjuzhet) 09:49
6.
Shedding (Bonus Track) 02:15
7.
Phosphor (Bonus Track) 04:18
8.
Rhodes (Bonus Track) 16:10
9.
East (Bonus Track) 19:25

about

Originally released back in 2008, this is my my first ever full length album; remastered for its 10th anniversary to sound as good as possible; which is not very good but then again, it was my first album after all.

It was entirely recorded in my University of Kent dorm room in Eliot College, I had no idea what I was doing in all honesty but you have to start somewhere.

The album was originally released on Highpointlowlife Records by Thorsten Sidepoint on the 4th of August 2008.

Some people even labelled the album Black Metal, of all things, and I was struggling to escape that internet tag for some time; modern fans should beware though as this is a little different to the newer Stray Ghost output.

I also included the EP Fabule Sjuzhet, which originally came out a few months after Losthilde on Dead Pilot records, and some unreleased tracks from the same period.

Both were available on CD for a short time.

The album was dedicated to someone once, but that wasn't a good idea anyway.

Here is a good, and a bad contemporary review:

"Ant Saggers aka Stray Ghost is a new name to me, but although this is his first physical release, it hardly sounds like the work of an optimistic young pup. Losthilde has the heavy weight of years of disappointment on its shoulders. It’s a kind of epic symphony of loss in four movements.

The opening ten minutes of the suite is funereal, with a mournful chord sequence played on what sounds like a guitar morphed into a cello. There is a distinct break halfway through the first piece as a babble of radio-static voices enter and fade into a stately, other-worldly guitar/cello and piano coda which swirls, ebbs and flows like a cosmic dust storm. The second part of “There’s An Ocean Between Us, You And I” starts with a crackle of electrostatic and gradually builds into an epic of controlled feedback, ending in a drawn-out drone of bass hum and the gently fading chime of a guitar chord.

Things don’t get cheerier through the two part “Saudade”, but they do get a hell of a lot angrier. Drums kick in, playing a slow march as great slabs of distorted guitar threaten to turn things into a Sunn0))) doomfest. But amidst the Sturm und Drang there are more reflective patches that are more akin to Loren Connors’ electric work. It never gets stuck in any particular groove for too long, but constantly shifts in tone and volume. There are plenty of drone-rock elements, but none of the “will this do” repetitive chord-bashing that makes so much doom metal (or whatever you want to call it) so dull. “Saudade Part Two” is almost like a summary of all that precedes it, with the melancholy drones of the album’s opening sequences splashed with drops of molten guitar and flashes of white noise. It splutters and creaks to a halt – no grandstanding epic finish here. Like most journeys, and most lives, the ending is anticlimactic.

Losthilde is an impressive work that manages to fill its epic length without resorting to the repeat-till-the-tape-runs-out excesses that some records of this ilk exhibit. It’s one of the most successful hybrids of quiet reflection and fierce noise that I’ve heard for a while, but never gets stuck in that quiet-build-loud-end cliché.

The album is available as a download and as a limited edition CDR from the Highpoint Lowlife website (see below). There’s also another collection, simply entitled Stray Ghost, on the site which is available for free. I’ve downloaded it, but not played it as yet."
- Music Musings and Miscellany

"Losthilde gets off to a great start with a two part ambient piece titled 'There's An Ocean Between Us, You And I', which is thick in atmosphere and entrenched in an overarching sense of gloom. All of a sudden, the tone changes dramatically, embracing a fizzy, doomy mess of a sound that perhaps unwisely includes some very roughly recorded drums and a guitar drone that sounds like the kind of thing you'd get on a black metal recording - you know the deal: some broadsword-wielding doofus thought it'd sound better to plug the instrument straight into a mixing board instead of using an amp. There's a similarly flat sound to the opening passages of 'Saudade Part One', but soon the atmosphere collapses in on itself, rendering a far more interesting, thicker soundscape filled with cavernous, filtered distortion."
- Boomkat

credits

released October 1, 2018

All music by Anthony Baden Saggers

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all rights reserved

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about

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Stray Ghost Brighton, UK

Stray Ghost is the artist name of the English composer Anthony Baden Saggers. He has released music through the record labels Phases, 1631, Hidden Shoal, Time Released Sound, Analogpath, Highpoint Lowlife, Dead Pilot (sleep tight) and Phantom Channel.

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