Dubbio Nil – Seed, Fruit, Thorn [Hymns]

I was surprised when I first put on this recent 3” from the Hymns label, because it didn’t have the “Hymns sound” I have come to expect, gnarled sourced material chewed up and spit out by a couple hundred broken fuzzboxes and broken radios.
Instead, from the get go, this Dubbio Nil stuff is unwaveringly beautiful. Incredibly lush synth strings sounding like some kind of astral choir. I suggest cranking it up and letting the sound envelope you. The piece moves fluidly, subtly changing through this first section until a repetitive guitar figure replaces the synth pads briefly before it succumbs to the stranglehold of some reverbed, manipulated sounds. The fields of everlasting light and splendor at the start of the track are now forgotten in this dank cavern. The subsequent section balances those two ideas; the synth returns but there is an ominous feel. It sounds more resigned than reveled. Shards of static scratch along while the synth shrivels into a field recording of storm, which itself shrivels into silence.
It is quite a well made piece, it moves pretty effortlessly through all its changes though it’s the first section that I’m really smitten by. The 3” cd-r is packaged in the stark, signature Hymns art work and as a cool little bonus it comes with a seed and planting instructions. I got a Poncirus Trifoliata. Pretty sweet.