Back in early-mid June, I was aimlessly looking at Youtube at about 2am when I noticed a video for the title track of Vanishing Amulet’s 2025 gothic synthesiser album “Moonlit Cryer”. At the time, the video had less than fifty views. Call it morbid curiosity or tiredness, but I clicked on the video.
From the faintly purple-tinted old painting of a castle and the fact that the band’s logo was in “tree-branch writing”, I was expecting some sort of growled metal music. But, to my surprise, it wasn’t a metal song. And it was also good enough to actually make me buy a digital copy of the album (in MP3 format) later in the day.
[And, on a side-note: This album is MUCH cheaper than it probably should be. It was £3.49 on Amazon at the time of writing in early-mid June, and the album’s Bandcamp page lets you pay what you want as long as it is more than one US dollar (though, if you’re in the UK, your bank will probably charge a currency conversion fee of some sort on top of that).]
The best way I can describe this – mostly instrumental – album is to imagine the moody retro synthesiser music from Vangelis’ 1982 soundtrack to the movie “Blade Runner”, but with the atmosphere of a 1990s Cradle Of Filth album and a tiny hint of Akira Yamaoka’s soundtrack to the classic survival horror game “Silent Hill 2” (2001/2024). This is so cool 🙂 I’ve only listened to the whole album maybe once or twice before writing this short review, so I apologise if I miss anything.
These songs are relaxing, but ominous. Melancholy, yet hopeful. This album is pure atmosphere in the best possible way 🙂 Aside from a dramatic spoken segment near the end of the first track, it seems to be completely instrumental. Some of the synthesisers have an old-school sound to them, an eerie piercing retro sci-fi wail which reminds me of old oscilloscopes. They sound analogue rather than digital. This is paired with ominous piano music and an array of sound effects, as well as a wonderfully dramatic spoken word segment in the first track.
Earlier I mentioned 1990s Cradle Of Filth and, whilst Vanishing Amulet’s “Moonlight Cryer” (2025) isn’t a metal album, it not only has the gothic atmosphere you’d expect from classic Filth songs like “Haunted Shores” or “Beauty Slept In Sodom”, but many of the song titles also sound like they could have shown up on an old Cradle Of Filth album as well – like “Crumbled Estate” and “Nobles Adorned Chamber Portraits”.
Yet, whilst it keeps the gothic atmosphere of 1990s Cradle Of Filth, the slow pacing and the style of the synthesisers genuinely feel like something from a neon-lit jazz bar in the movie “Blade Runner” (1982). It has that sort of melancholy relaxation to it, with a tiny undercurrent of hope and optimism, which sometimes genuinely makes you feel like you’re a morally-ambiguous detective in a 1980s future, drinking whisky from a square glass whilst the headlights of flying cars gently drift across the rain-spattered night sky.
This mixture of sorrow and hope, this feeling of “dark relaxation”, is also mildly evocative of Akira Yamaoka’s music for “Silent Hill 2” (2001/2024) at times as well 🙂 And the opening segment of “Elisabet’s Jewelry Box” almost sounds like something from this game too. The quiet, sombre piano twinkling like tears in darkness. You almost expect to hear an electric guitar kick in as James Sunderland walks away into the swirling fog. But there are no guitars, just atmospheric pianos and bittersweet synthesiser music, like a shaft of early-morning sunlight through the window of a smoky hotel room in 1993.
And the beginning of “Ghostly Ballroom” also feels like it could have come from a 1990s computer game in the best possible way 🙂 Like, I can imagine some pre-rendered old building in a a “Point and Click” game, or J.C.Denton from “Deus Ex” (2000) entering a gloomy stone building whilst this part plays. Yet, listening to this part again, there’s also a hint of the 1980s to it – of an abandoned shopping mall room filled with desolate mannequins, with dark blue skies and silhouetted tower blocks outside the large windows.
Listening to the album as a whole in the background, one interesting thing is how well each song merges into each other. It can sometimes be difficult to tell where one ends and the next begins. It isn’t an eight-track album, it’s almost more like one thirty-eight minute song split into eight parts. The album is consistent enough to feel unified, but with enough variety to prevent it from becoming monotonous. Most of all though, it’s more of a mood. From what little information I’ve been able to find, the whole album was created by just one goth called “Withering Prince”. And, like indie survival horror games which are made by just one person, this does add a subtle something to the album.
And it’s sort of perfect. Again, imagine a combination of the downbeat moments in “Blade Runner” (1982), but with the atmosphere of a 1990s Cradle Of Filth album. Of old decaying manor houses, but in a moody 1980s version of the future. The overall emotion is gloomy and forlorn, but with enough subtle hints of hope and optimism to prevent it feeling too depressing. And this album is a lot better than something which still only had double-digit views on Youtube a day or so after it was released should be.
If I had to give it a rating out of five, it would get a solid five. Listen to it!
