Paysage D'hiver

Black metal reaches its outermost limits through Paysage d’Hiver, the solo endeavor of the principal member from Swiss collective Darkspace. Across more than a dozen recordings to date, beginning with a series of restricted editions that gave way to broader distribution with the 2020 release Im Wald, audiences are drawn into linked transmissions from an invented realm of ice, rendered through instrumental textures as unrefined as the style permits.

The project originated with Bern-born multi-instrumentalist Tobias Möckl, who performs under the Wintherr pseudonym. Möckl also participates in the minimalist ambient black metal group Darkspace. On every Paysage d’Hiver recording he handles vocals and all instrumentation, commencing with the three simultaneous 1998 issues Steineiche, Schattengang, and Die Festung. Most of the project’s output through the opening years of the twenty-first century appeared in runs limited to between 200 and 300 copies. Individual releases recount episodes from an extended trek across the austere imaginary territory called Paysage d’Hiver, the French phrase for “winter landscape,” which Möckl intends to mirror his own private inner explorations. Although he has avoided specifying their precise significance aside from naming Norwegian band Burzum as a primary inspiration, the distinctive fusion of black metal’s harshest elements with passages of pure ambient immersion has exerted a strong pull on listeners who locate significance within apparent sonic disorder.

Following numerous limited-edition albums and split releases alongside kindred artists such as Vinterriket and Nordlich, Möckl broadened Paysage d’Hiver’s availability in 2010 by issuing the full catalog in both physical and digital formats. The tenth project release, 2013’s Das Tor, marked the first title issued under this wider approach, yet it remained the final solo outing for almost ten years. Paysage d’Hiver resurfaced in 2020 with Im Wald and Im Traum, which Möckl designated the project’s inaugural official album and EP, reclassifying earlier works as demos. Since that return, two further albums have appeared: Geister in 2021 and Die Berge in 2024.