The worlds of doom metal and dark folk will collide on the collaborative album Stygian Bough Volume I, which sees doom metal duo Bell Witch collaborate with singer-songwriter Aerial Ruin as Stygian Bough. The three artists have released a collaborative single titled “Heaven Torn Low II (the toll),” which will appear on the upcoming album out on June 26th.

“Heaven Torn Low II (the toll)” is a grand song clocking in at over eight and a half minutes, complete with long drawn out guitar chords, channeling elements of post rock and Erik Moggridge’s (the figure behind Aerial Ruin) voice. The instrumental provides a bulk of the emotional core for the song, as it provides pensive tone that immediately draws the listener in.

Stygian Bow is a reference to The Golden Bough, a book written by Scottish anthropologist Sir James George Frazer. Its themes discuss a circular narrative of kings and slaves, where each time a king is killed by a slave, a new one emerges, causing a cycle of violence.

“On this new album our ghost upon the waves flees not towards the land but towards death. The narrative, as much as it exists, is loose and not linear and definitely stream of consciousness,” Moggridge explained in a press release. “There are cyclical and spherical qualities to the journey where death, desolation, and the spirit are reflected in myriad ways.”

Bell Witch consists of Dylan Desmond and Jesse Shreibman who formed the outfit back in 2010. Their latest album release Mirror Reaper came out in 2017.

Stygian Bough Volume 1

1 The Bastard Wind
2 Heaven Torn Low I (the passage)
3 Heaven Torn Low II (the toll)
4 Prelude
5 The Unbodied Air