A discussion with Dawn Terry: Discovering a Note and Moving Forward

us were huge nerds and we wanted to steep ourselves in this world, make it as immersive as possible,” she explains. “I’d been learning Norwegian for a year or so and it was a lot of fun. Really bloody difficult, but I wanted that total translation immersion. Going into different characters; taking on different roles. The music really fed off that nerdery. The first album was a real foray into that. Musically, awkward and difficult, but really fun. Creating this music to fit this world; to be a soundtrack for this environment. It was a different character every time and I got really posh and squatted in an English accent! But the long and short of it is that I couldn’t play a bloody thing.”

Despite the project’s tongue-in-cheek orthodoxy, the music itself was imbued with a real sense of arcane eeriness. “I wanted to go for that ancient vibe; the Tolkienesque. Just drag that out a bit and make it a bit more creepy sounding,” says Terry. Immediate reactions to the project were thus mixed; some thought it hilarious, but there was also considerable support and interest. A full back story was created – almost a parody of the seriousness so prevalent in extreme metal – as Trollmann Av Ildtoppberg’s digital-only first LP was released with a full bandcamp frontpage detailing every aspect of Mordraneeth and Terry as characters within the gamebook world. The whole thing even came with a digital replica of the map and notebook you’d find in a rule book.Rolling in time with the unmistakable sonic impact of figures like Mortiis, Vond and Wongraven, Terry went on to release a further two albums as Trollmann Av Ildtoppberg before moving onto projects more closely reflecting the music she is currently making.

From such archly humorous beginnings, Terry moved more deeply into exploring drone, culminating in 2017’s From The Core To The Seed where she subtly began to weave in treated field recordings and spoken word elements. But for Terry the major shift was away from the Dungeons and Dragons aesthetic and towards more personal cosmic introspection. Now performing solo with her ever-present hurdy-gurdy, Terry—a recent convert to Doom Yoga—finds solace, grounding, and invention in her intensively slow pace plans for 2026 include a new release; a retrospective with Bong (although she is adamant that the band is on hiatus) and preparation for a performance of Songs of Experience, put on by Apostle Records. Much of the new record is, says Terry, characterised by influences as diverse as Skara Brae – stream takes and drones with a slowly building, looping climax – and William Blake, of whom Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore bought Terry’s Terry’s Songs of Innocence.

“I was an ardent Blake fan at University,” says Terry. “I grew up with A Child’s Kiss and it was just a given that Blake was gonna be my go-to from early on. He was just so goddamned corny! So bloody heart-wrenching and ridiculous and obviously because he didn’t sleep, he was a bit loose. I love his cyclic nature so much but he also has that weird ‘just looking out for the little guy from Scotland’ vibe. It was pretty cool having him write my Zero Hours Contract. He brought the hammer down. I really learned a lot. If you can buy Brady Gabhoury’s moog whisper record – dad’s dying days – it’s pretty rad. Worth a shout.”