The first minutes of Mendel Kaelen‘s “Remembering What Was Forgotten” are perfectly in line with its cover image: building from silence, slowly out of nothing, but gradually becoming clearer, crescending into an immersive and overwhelming wave of sound… before fading back to eternal rest.
The near 70 minutes of this album seem to breathe an immersive calm, the sound of nature’s inevitability…maybe also the sound of ‘Satori‘, a Buddhist term for ” a flash of sudden awareness, or individual enlightenment”.
Mendel Kaelen is a composer from Groningen, Holland. “Remembering What Was Forgotten” is his first full CD release, after previously released EP’s together with Machinist.
Sometimes the depth of his layered sounds remind me of some of the best work of Thomas Köner, although Kaelen clearly works from a different angle.
The sources of this electro-acoustic music are mainly organic. Field recordings, sounds of stones, piano and (multi-layered) violin – resulting in this organic sounding drone music, and with an exceptional dynamic in intensity.
It is not very often that I find an album this impressing from the first listen, and which even gains after repeated listens.
“Remembering What Was Forgotten” is self-released, not available on any label. Which is a shame, in fact, because it will hardly be discovered by those that may enjoy it.
But the good news is: it can still be ordered directly from Kaelen’s website.
Best 10 minutes of my working day…