---
title: One Note to Rule Them All
date: 2026-04-21
description: A love letter to the genre that makes people ask "is your speaker broken?"
tags: [music]
image: /assets/img/drone.jpg
---

Music does things to people. Some genres make you feel nostalgic and happy. Some
get you feeling sad, while others make you angry or hyped-up. I'm not going to
give examples because, let's be honest, we're all different and what gets me
hyped-up might be the exact thing that makes you sad.

There's one genre I listen to that most people aren't keen on, and that genre
is: Drone. So what exactly is it?

## Drone?

Drone music is built around sustained tones, minimal harmonic movement, and
repetition. Instead of focusing on melody or rhythm in the traditional sense, it
emphasizes texture, atmosphere, and gradual change over time. The sound can feel
meditative, hypnotic, or even overwhelming, depending on how it's performed.

## Types of Drone

Let's be clear, there are _a lot_ of Drone subgenres. I mostly listen to
drone-metal, with the main proponent of that subgenre being [Sunn O)))][sunn]
(pronounced "Sunn"), but here's a more formal (yet incomplete) list:

- **Drone Metal (Drone Doom)**: The heaviest and most physically intense
  subgenre. It uses massive, down-tuned guitars, heavy distortion, and feedback.
  It is meant to be felt as much as heard, often lacking traditional percussion.

- **Ambient Drone (Drone Ambient)**: A softer, more textural approach that
  prioritizes atmosphere and spatial sound. It often overlaps with New Age and
  focuses on creating a sense of calm or introspection.

- **Dark Drone / Dark Ambient**: Characterized by ominous, low-frequency
  rumbles, industrial noises, and a "horror" or "catacomb" atmosphere. It often
  uses minor keys and dissonant overtones.

- **Minimalist / Avant-Garde Drone**: The "academic" roots of the genre.
  Emerging in the 1960s, it focuses on the mathematical and psychoacoustic
  properties of sound, often using "just intonation" or very slight frequency
  shifts.

- **Drone Rock / Space Rock**: Rock music that ditches traditional chord
  progressions in favour of a single, sustained harmonic centre. This style
  often uses motorik beats or repetitive psychedelic rhythms.

- **Folk / Traditional Drone**: This category includes centuries-old traditions
  that use instruments specifically designed for droning, such as the Scottish
  bagpipe (pibroch), the Indian tanpura, or the Australian didgeridoo.

- **Blackened Drone**: A fusion of Black Metal and Drone. It takes the "wall of
  sound" and tremolo picking of black metal but removes the speed and drums,
  resulting in a bleak, freezing atmosphere.

...and there's more than this still.

## The History of Drone

You might be surprised to discover that drone isn't something new. When I first
started listening to what I thought was drone music, it was actually
drone-metal. I was fascinated to discover that one of my favourite bands in that
subgenre wasn't the originators (not even close!).

I went back to 1993 and found [Earth], who released an EP called "Earth 2:
special low frequency version" which was ahead of its time (at least in the
subgenre of drone-metal). But then I discovered no... a popular sludge band
called [The Melvins] released an EP called "Joe Preston" (named after their
bassist at the time) which seems to be one of the earliest known recorded
drone-metal releases.

> 💡 **FUN FACT**:\
> I discovered many years later Joe Preston covering live bass duties for one of
> my favourite bands [SUMAC].

Again, at this point, what I'm thinking of as drone was actually drone-metal,
and so my mind was suitably blown when someone much older than me told me to go
check out The Velvet Underground's song "Loop" (from 1966). It's not quite the
same as drone-metal but it's unmistakably drone.

So I started digging into the history and realised, why of course, this is an
ancient sound. A spiritual tool. The goal was often to induce a trance state or
represent the infinite. Drone was the "eternal hum" that mimics everything from
the wind in caves to the circulatory system in our own ears.

Let's consider some of the ancient roots:

- **Indian Classical Music**: The Tanpura is perhaps the most iconic drone
  instrument. It provides a continuous harmonic foundation that represents the
  "unstruck sound" of the universe.

- **Aboriginal Australian Traditions**: The Didgeridoo (Yidaki) has been used
  for over 1,000 years, using circular breathing to create an unbroken, resonant
  low frequency.

- **Byzantine and Gregorian Chant**: Early Christian music often featured an
  "isison," a lower vocal part that held a single steady note while other voices
  moved above it.

- **Bagpipes**: From Scotland to Iran, the drone pipes of various bagpipe
  traditions provide a constant harmonic floor that creates that "wall of sound"
  effect.

So when did we start transitioning from "ancient ritual" to "art movement"?
Well, we have a few people to thank for that...

- Luigi Russolo (1910s): Wrote The Art of Noises, celebrating industrial hums
  and machinery.
- La Monte Young (1950s): Often called the "Daddy of Drone." He focused on
  "sustained tones" and created a 6 hour movement called "The Well-Tuned
  Piano"\*\*.
- Tony Conrad & John Cale (1960s): Members of the Theatre of Eternal Music. Cale
  took these "dream chord" ideas straight into The Velvet Underground.
- Brian Eno (1970s): Defined Ambient Music. His work moved drone from the
  "challenging avant-garde" into a soothing, atmospheric space.

> 💡 **NOTE**:\
> \*\*I've tried listening to "The Well-Tuned Piano", but it's too sparse for me.

## Why Drone?

So... what _is_ it about drone music that makes it so appealing to people?

Think about it. Inside the womb, a fetus is surrounded by a constant, 24/7 wall
of sound. This isn't just a quiet hum; it's often measured at 70 to 90 decibels,
roughly the volume of a vacuum cleaner or a loud shower. Because the baby is
submerged in amniotic fluid, high-frequency sounds from the outside world are
muffled, leaving a thick, bass-heavy drone.

This is why we often play "white noise" to calm babies when they go to sleep.
The sudden silence of a nursery can actually be startling and stressful. White
noise signals their nervous system that they are safe. This is also why many
_adults_ listen to white noise when they go to bed.

> _Silence is deafening._\
> -- Thomas Carlyle (Circa 1831)

It’s not the noise that wakes you. It’s the inconsistency of sound. In a silent
room, a floorboard creak or a car door slamming creates a massive spike in
acoustic energy. The drone "fills in" the acoustic gaps, making sudden noises
much less likely to trigger the brain's "alert" reflex.

Now, we've been talking about "white" noise, but really there are multiple
_colours_:

- **White**: Equal energy per frequency. Sounds like a harsh hiss (think radio
  static). Rarely used as a melodic element but often serves as a "wall" in
  harsh noise music.

- **Pink**: Equal energy per octave. Sounds more balanced to the human ear, like
  falling rain or leaves rustling. In drone, this is often the sweet spot for
  creating a sense of natural space.

- **Brown**: Energy decreases as frequency increases. Much deeper and
  bass-heavy, like a distant roar or a low rumble.

When talking about drone-metal (which is what I’m focused on), what we’re
really talking about is the amplification of brown noise. The goal is often to
_vibrate_ the listener’s body. This requires a heavy concentration of low-end
energy, and brown noise is mathematically the closest noise colour to the sound
of a wall of dimmed amplifiers vibrating at sub-bass frequencies.

Drone-metal guitarists use massive amounts of distortion and fuzz. As you add
more _gain_, the signal clips, adding harmonic content that begins to resemble
white or pink noise. Controlled feedback loops act as a living, breathing noise
floor that the musician sculpts over time.

While white noise can feel clinical or irritating, brown noise provides the
_warmth_ and doom essential to the drone-metal aesthetic.

At a basic level, drone strips music down to time + tone. When you remove melody
and rhythm, your attention shifts. There’s also a physical angle: sustained low
frequencies literally vibrate your body, which makes the experience less
intellectual and more _visceral_.

With repetition and no clear “events,” your brain stops anticipating what’s
next. Because nothing is demanding your attention, your thoughts start to
surface. For some, that’s clarity. That ambiguity is the point. Unlike most
music, drone doesn’t tell you what to feel; it creates a space where feeling
happens.

For me, drone (or specifically drone-metal) makes me feel like I'm being
swallowed by a black hole. By being engulfed in sound, it helps me lock out any
other thoughts. It's very much a meditative experience.

## ...ever breathe a frequency?

Have you ever been so surrounded by a sound that it feels like it’s part of
your body; like you’re inhaling and exhaling it? It’s less about music as
entertainment, and more about music as an environment you inhabit.

Sunn O)))'s live shows have a very physical impact on their audience. With their
use of volume, their sound turns into a bodily experience. You don’t just hear
it...you _feel_ it.

Sunn O))) are one of the most famous modern groups connected to drone music. But
they didn't start there.

Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson formed Sunn O))) in 1998. Both came from
heavier, more structured backgrounds. O'Malley had been playing in **Burning
Witch**, a doom/sludge band that leaned into slow, punishing riffs but still had
vocals, song structure, and recognisable metal form. Anderson was in
**Goatsnake**, a stoner doom band with grooves you could actually nod along to.

Their shared obsession was [Earth]. Specifically, the _Earth 2_ EP I mentioned
earlier. That record was already stripping out drums and vocals to leave nothing
but massively amplified, glacially slow guitar. O'Malley and Anderson wanted to
take that idea further. Not just slow and heavy, but _dense_.

Their early recordings (the _ØØ Void_ and _Flight of the Behemoth_ era) still
had traces of metal DNA. There are moments of black metal influence,
particularly in the atmosphere. That frozen, cavernous quality, that bands like
[Burzum] and [Darkthrone] were known for. But where black metal achieved that
feeling through speed and tremolo picking, Sunn O))) achieved it through
absence. No blast beats. No shrieks. Just massive, sustained chords decaying
into overtones.

By the time _White1_ and _White2_ came out (2003-2004), the transformation was
more or less complete. These records aren't metal in any conventional sense.
They're explorations of texture, volume, and physical space. _White1_ features
collaborations with people outside the metal world entirely, like [Merzbow]
(Japanese noise artist) and **Rex Ritter** (who brought analogue synths into the
mix). This was Sunn O))) becoming something closer to a sound art project that
happened to use guitar amplifiers.

The _Black One_ (2005) is where things get really interesting. It's their most
overtly "metal" record since the early days. There are vocal contributions from
**Wrest** (Leviathan/Lurker of Chalice) and **Malefic** (Xasthur), both one-man
black metal projects known for isolation and claustrophobia. As the story goes:
Malefic recorded his vocals while locked inside a coffin 😬 (helping to capture
the spirit of the record).

From there, the collaborations kept expanding. _Altar_ (2006) with [Boris]
blended their drone with Boris's more dynamic range. _Monoliths & Dimensions_
(2009) brought in brass, choirs, a trombone soloist, and arrangements by
**Eyvind Kang**. By this point, calling them a metal band felt genuinely
inaccurate. They'd evolved into something that sat between doom metal, academic
composition, and performance art.

Their more recent work, _Pyroclasts_ (2019) and _Metta, Benevolence BBC 6Music:
Live on the Invitation of Mary Anne Hobbs_ (2021), leans further into the
meditative side. _Pyroclasts_ was built from improvised drone sessions recorded
at the beginning and end of each day during the _Life Metal_ sessions. It's
some of their most accessible work, and also some of their most beautiful.

What makes Sunn O)))'s evolution worth tracing is that it wasn't a clean break
from metal. Each release peeled away another layer of conventional structure
until what remained was pure tone and physical presence. They didn't reject
their roots. This was simply boiling them down to their essence.

> 💡 **FUN FACT**:\
> Sunn O))) took their name (and logo) from Sunn Musical Equipment, an American
> amp company that ran from the 1960s through the early 2000s. The O))) part?
> That's the company's original sun logo! They basically named themselves after
> their favourite amplifier.

![Sunn O)))](/assets/img/sunn.jpg)

## Drone-metal Hall of Fame

If you've made it this far, then you're probably someone who has the right level
of curiosity to want to try out some drone-metal. So here are some tracks worth
starting with. Most of these are Sunn O))) because, well, I love them. I've
thrown in a couple of older tracks that predate Sunn entirely (as mentioned
earlier), because you can't appreciate where drone-metal ended up without
hearing where it started.

### Hands First Flower

**The Melvins** - _Joe Preston_ (1992)

Before Earth 2, before Sunn O))), there was this. The Melvins' _Joe Preston_ EP
(named after their bassist at the time) is one of the earliest proper
drone-metal recordings. "Hands First Flower" is a slab of slow, crushing,
feedback-drenched guitar that just _sits_ there. There's no progression in the
traditional sense. It's a single idea stretched to its breaking point. Coming
from a band known for sludgy punk riffs, this was a sharp left turn that
basically said: what if we just played one thing and made it unbearably heavy?
It predates Earth 2 by a full year, which makes it arguably the first recorded
moment where someone thought "what if doom metal, but less?"

### Seven Angels

**Earth** - _Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version_ (1993)

If "Hands First Flower" planted the seed, "Seven Angels" grew it into something
enormous. This is 20 minutes of a single, massively amplified guitar chord
decaying and regenerating over and over. Dylan Carlson (Earth's guitarist) tuned
his guitar absurdly low and let the harmonics do the work. There's no drums, no
vocals, no structure. Just a wall of tone that shifts like weather. _Earth 2_
didn't push drone-metal into the mainstream (nothing ever really has), but it
exposed the idea to a much wider audience. Without this EP, Sunn O))) probably
doesn't exist, at least not in the form we know them.

### Etna

**Sunn O))) & Boris** - _Altar_ (2006)

_Altar_ is the collision of two bands who approach heaviness from completely
different angles. Boris bring dynamics, rhythm, and a willingness to actually
move between ideas. Sunn O))) bring the glacial weight. "Etna" is where those
two approaches fuse most effectively. It builds from near-silence into something
genuinely volcanic (the title isn't subtle about it). Boris's Atsuo plays drums
on this record, which is notable because Sunn O))) almost never use percussion.
The result is drone with forward momentum, which sounds like a contradiction but
works beautifully.

### Kannon 1

**Sunn O)))** - _Kannon_ (2015)

After the sprawling orchestral ambition of _Monoliths & Dimensions_, _Kannon_
was a deliberate step back. Three tracks, all called "Kannon", all built from
the same basic elements: guitar, amplifier, feedback, voice. The album takes its
name from the Japanese bodhisattva of compassion, and there's a ritualistic
quality to it. "Kannon 1" opens with that familiar low rumble, but there's a
clarity to it that the earlier records didn't have. It feels focused rather than
sprawling. Less "look what we can do" and more "this is all we need."

### Aurora

**Sunn O)))** - _Life Metal_ (2019)

_Life Metal_ is the warmest thing Sunn O))) have ever made. Recorded with Steve
Albini at Electrical Audio, the production is remarkably clean for a band built
on distortion and feedback. "Aurora" captures that shift perfectly. There's a
tangible positivity in the sound that's hard to describe if you're used to their
earlier, more oppressive work. The harmonic overtones ring out instead of
collapsing into mud. It still _vibrates_ you, but it feels like sunlight rather
than suffocation. This is the record I'd give to someone who's never heard Sunn
O))) and might actually want to enjoy the experience.

### Frost (C)

**Sunn O)))** - _Pyroclasts_ (2019)

_Pyroclasts_ was born from the _Life Metal_ sessions. At the beginning and end
of each recording day, the musicians would improvise a drone piece together, no
plan, no structure, just tone. "Frost (C)" is one of those improvisations, and
it's some of the most meditative music Sunn O))) have produced. Where _Life
Metal_ had shape and direction, _Pyroclasts_ just floats. It's the closest
they've come to pure ambient drone, and it's genuinely beautiful in a way that
would surprise anyone who only knows them from the robed, fog-machine era.

### Troubled Air

**Sunn O)))** - _Metta, Benevolence BBC 6Music: Live on the Invitation of Mary
Anne Hobbs_ (2021)

This is a live recording, and it takes "Troubled Air" (originally from _Life
Metal_) and stretches it into something much larger. The extended arrangement
brings in jazz elements that weren't present in the studio version, with brass
and woodwind weaving through the drone. It's Sunn O))) at their most
collaborative and expansive. The live setting adds an unpredictability that suits
the improvised nature of their music. You can hear the room, the space between
the instruments, the moments where the musicians are listening to each other and
deciding where to go next.

### Evil Chuck

**Sunn O)))** - _Evil Chuck_ EP (2023)

Named after Chuck Schuldiner (founder of Death, the band widely credited with
pioneering death metal), this EP is Sunn O)))'s tribute to someone who pushed
boundaries in a completely different direction. The track itself is dense and
low, even by their standards, with a funereal quality that suits the dedication.
There's a reverence to it. Where a lot of metal tributes try to imitate the
artist they're honouring, Sunn O))) did what they always do: they filtered the
idea through their own process and turned it into pure tone.

### Raise the Chalice

**Sunn O)))** - _Eternity's Pillars_ (2025)

_Eternity's Pillars_ continues the trajectory that _Life Metal_ and
_Pyroclasts_ set in motion. "Raise the Chalice" has a ceremonial weight to it.
The title suggests ritual, and the music delivers on that. It's slow, layered,
and patient in a way that rewards repeated listening. Each time through, you hear
overtones and textural details that weren't apparent before. This is Sunn O)))
fully settled into what they are: not a metal band, not an ambient project, but
something that exists in the sustained space between the two.

### Glory Black

**Sunn O)))** - _Sunn O)))_ (2026)

Their self-titled Sub Pop debut, and it feels like a statement of arrival (thirty
years in). "Glory Black" is the standout. Piano and nature elements run
throughout the record, which is a significant departure from their usual
palette of guitar and amplifier. The piano doesn't soften the music so much as
give it a different kind of weight. There are moments where field recordings of
wind and water surface beneath the drone, grounding it in something organic. It's
Sunn O))) acknowledging that the sound they've spent decades building doesn't
have to come from a guitar.

[boris]: https://boris.bandcamp.com/
[burzum]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burzum
[darkthrone]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkthrone
[earth]: https://earthsl.bandcamp.com/
[merzbow]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merzbow
[sumac]: https://sumac.bandcamp.com/
[sunn]: https://sunn.bandcamp.com/
[the melvins]: https://melvinsofficial.bandcamp.com/