Category: ambient music

Listening Mirror – Resting in Aspic

Although relatively young (they formed in the beginning of 2010), Listening Mirror (a duo consisting of Jeff Stonehouse and Kate Tustain) is quickly becoming a ‘reference point’ in environmental ambient music.

Basically, their new album “Resting in Aspic“ is a collection of previously released material (although in different versions, remastered by Wil Bolton, and also including a new track: “Without Saying Goodbye”).
But together, these tracks are a perfectly balanced album – a great introduction for those new to Listening Mirror, and a welcome addition to those that were already familiar with their style.

Simon Whetham – Mall Muzak


Mall Muzak

The original Muzak, aka Elevator Music, may represent all the music you don’t want to listen to actively.
Intended and created as unobtrusive music played in shopping malls, designed to make you feel good and spend more money without realising you hear anything at all, this kind of music definitely has it’s own -conceptual-  kind of charm.  

Simon Whetham’s  latest release,  “Mall Muzak” is about the exact opposite of that kind of music.

Machinefabriek + Celer – Maastunnel-Mt. Mitake

Well here’s a little gem that will definitely be a collector’s item quickly: 

Celer (Will Long) and Machinefabriek (Rutger Zuydervelt) – two giants of the ambient-electronic improv scene – met and performed together in Tokyo in 2010, and decided to collaborate on these tracks about a year later. Exchanging an reconstructing each others audio files has resulted in this 7″ vinyl release: “Maastunnel-Mt. Mitake“.
An impressive, though short, ‘audio bridge’ between Rotterdam and Tokyo.

Hior Chronik, Kane Ikin, Marcus Fischer, Nils Quak, Karol Gwozdz

In the Shortlist sections, I will mention some of the albums that I enjoyed listening to, but couldn’t find the time (or the right words) for a “full” review for. Still, I think they deserve your attention: use the links to find more info and hear previews.

Hior Chronik

Hior Chronik – Unspoken Words Spotify
On his second album, Hior Chronik (Greece) combines the finest elements to create a well-balanced palette of ambient soundscapes, acoustic elements and melancholic themes. 
The enthousiastic recommendations by Hauschka (“Definitely a part of my soundtrack for this year autumn and dark winter times.”), Nils Frahm (“Essential experimental music!” ), Sawako and Will Long (Celer) may indicate that this is an album that should not be missed. And it definitely is!

Contrail

Kane Ikin – Contrail Spotify
Also known as half of the Solo Andata duo, Kane Ikin presents his first solo project as a 4-track EP release: two tracks on a clear vinyl 7″, the other two as additional download tracks. For this 20+ minute album, “he recorded everything through and onto old technology — aged analog consoles, reel-to-reel tape — and all heard through a hazy science fiction filter.”

 

Markus Mehr – In

Markus Mehr‘s new album “In” is the promising first part of a trilogy: it will be followed by “On” (june 2012) and “Off” (january 2013), so the entire trilogy will take an exact year to complete. 

“In” features two long tracks, “Komo” and“Ostinato”, about 25 minutes each.
At first listen, two albums come to mind that explore a similar compositional process: Gavin Bryars’ “Jesus Blood Never Failed Me Yet” and William Basinski’s “Disintegration Loops”. 
But the comparision fails, because Mehr chooses quite a different approach to ‘minimal loops repeating’.

Interesting Collaborations

In the Shortlist sections, I will mention some of the albums that I enjoyed listening to, but couldn’t find the time (or the right words) for a “full” review for. Still, I think they deserve your attention: use the links to find more info and hear previews.

Night Blossom

The Beautiful Schizophonic & Yui Onodera – Night Blossom
The Beautiful Schizophonic (Jorge Mantas, Portugal) and Yui Onodera (Japan), two renowned sound artists,  continue to refine their collaborative work that started in 2009, with “Radiance”. 
Immersive, yet restrained, beauty. 

Woven Tide

From the Mouth of the Sun – Woven Tide
From the Mouth of the Sun is the name of the first project of Dag Rosenqvist (Jasper TX)  and Aaron Martin. Just mentioning these two names should raise your interest!
“Out of the charred embers of dusk Woven Tide emerges with an incandescent glow. Each glimmer cast by the sustained notes of ebony keys, the taut strings of the cello, and the rampant buzz of guitar lights our way, gives us hope, brings us into the dawn of a new day. As From The Mouth of the Sun, the duo act as our torchbearers, scrawling messages along the walls of an elongated cave, toiling through the decayed remnants of fetid matter to create eight illuminating pieces.”

Bernocchi, Budd, Guthrie – Winter Garden

If you are familiar with the works of Harold Budd together with Robin Guthrie  (Cocteau Twins) on earlier classics like Lovely Thunder, The Moon and the Melodies, The White Arcades and Before the Night Falls/After the Day Breaks, you will probably have a good idea what this new album sounds like.

Compared to these earlier albums, “Winter Garden” may hold no radical surprises. 
But in case of this particular album that is definitely meant as a positive remark: never change a winning formula, as they say!

Stillness [Mix]


Stillness

“Stillness”
image by imago2007

This mix obviously found its name from the lovely intro (and outtro) track by Nest.
Inbetween, there are many moments of ‘stillness’, too… Moments you may slowly drift off into the drones, letting your mind wander … to be pulled back again by some of the post-classical ‘anchors’ in this mix by Winged Victory For the Sullen, Human Greed, Vladimír Gódar, and Maya Beiser (member of Bang on a Can, with a stunning cello performance of the Djivan Gasparyan composition ‘Memories’).

Most of the tracks featured in this were released in 2011. But this mix is nót intended as a “Best of..” overview. That would result in a mix with an entirely different atmosphere (- and much longer, because one hour would not be enough to cover all the great releases I have enjoyed in 2011).

Maybe it’s a good way to start a new year with a small opportunity to retreat from current society’s turmoil, and to find some time to ‘cocoon’ to the sounds (and the sometimes fascinating depths) of ‘Stillness’.

Some word of warning, however: if this suggests this mix only contains warm, comfortable and pleasurable sounds, be prepared for some suprises.
I never said that “Stillness” always means “Comforting”…

Best wishes for 2012 to all of you!

Ben Frost & Daniel Bjarnason; Daniel Thomas Freeman; A Shadow; I8U; Sister Waize

In the Shortlist sections, I will mention some of the albums that I enjoyed listening to, but couldn’t find the time (or the right words) for a “full” review for. Still, I think they deserve your attention: use the links to find more info and hear previews.

Solaris

Ben Frost & Daniel Bjarnason – Solaris
With the names of these two composers and the title referring to the classic SF movie, further introduction is completetely superfluous. This is “a quiet, stilled and all consuming symphonic suite at once as affecting and uncanny as the science- fiction classic that inspired it”. 
As mysterious as the movie, Solaris is “a journey into an internal world, into the self, a flux of wonder, horror, sorrow and tenderness, and a ravishing sensory experience”.

The Beauty of Doubting Yourself

Daniel Thomas Freeman – The Beauty of Doubting Yourself
With a title like that an album hardly needs any further introduction. The album starts off pitch black with track titles like “Dark House Walk” and “Staring into Black Water” (25 minutes!), but the ovarall atmosphere gradually gets lighter and more optimistic as does the instrumentation. Dark electronic settings slowly make way for mediaeval sounding string arrangements. Not many albums can present a sound palette like this in such a coherent style.