Curiosity is a hard currency measured and weighted by an impermeable, immeasurable gold standard when it comes to musical experiences nowadays.
When we were young, we used to taunt and pester each other, tugging at the coat cuffs, gently slapping each others leather jackets and torn up T-shirts with the back of our palms to garner the attention when a shiny disk arrived in the mail, or better yet, in an indiscernible stack at the record shop. We used to spend the time listening to albums together, in dusty rooms, with moldy books on the shelves, smoke from a cigarette pouring out a half open windowpane, dreaming of that red guitar in the storefront, grinning ear to ear when spotting a barely cracked cymbal and an impacted snare at a garage sale.
Maybe these memories were pure hallucinations now all these years on, and the sentimental rosy glasses have turned into dark-rimmed cynical spectacles, but for the few still dreaming, these moments of connection still live on, if even in the solitary company of ourselves and our record collections, email chains, or forums and messenger services. It all still starts with a spark.
The story of this spark starts with Lane Oliver of the Dallas band Yatsu. Oliver casually posted Dola’s new record — Tabernakulum in a forum online. Intrigued by the cover, the click led down an 8-bit colored corridor of wonder, amusement and awe. Doubt often runs through the blood of the purveyors of these underground scenes, and it is easy to get quickly enamored by some other shiny object glimmering in a periphery. This experience was different. There was a careful reading of the lyrics as the music played. With every additional click, there were images of overjoyed looks of the tracking of this album, credits mentioning IHS from Biesy, Gruzja, Glitchangel; heartfelt messages to fans. For music as dark as this, there was a lightness and freshness to the presentation. An idiosyncrasy not uncommon for the Polish scene. Between the Let The World Burn Coalition, Devoted Art Propaganda, wędrowcy~tułacze~zbiegi, Pagan Records, Nihil, Koniec Pola and numerous others, Dola (or “fatum”) represents yet another destiny for small enclaves of music still burning out the hearts and minds of their listeners with fascination and surprise.
Billed in part as Black Metal, it provides a serpentine cover for what lies within its castlevania-styled walls. Through the downward steps into this chalice of secrets and traps endures a vision much more mischievous and free. There is a bounce and depth to this that still manages to kick you in the teeth with total earnesty and provide a comfortable ground to fall onto to not entirely crack your head open, for if that happened, the precarious tightrope that the trio has built would tear into sixteen hundred pieces. Those pieces—form the universe of Dola.
It would be remiss to say that the journey ends with Tabernakulum (or appropriately named tabernacle) as the holy presence in the discography of Dola. As with the full album listening experience with your friends after those fateful trips to the record store, so is the listening experience for all the other records in this bands’ library. Every album offers a different and varying statement about their own existence — whether venturing into the scene of their locale or the world at large. These records are bold chapters in a book decorated with elements that recall both a naive childhood and a vast future yet to be explored.
