Ambient / Drone

Review: **Tracks 'Sixth Sequence' and 'Tenth Sequence' are bonus tracks & exclusive to the vinyl release only.**

Past Inside The Present is pleased to announce 'Wave Variations' which is a new mini-album by veteran ambient producer Dennis Huddleston AKA 36.

36 has often enjoyed exploring self-imposed restrictions, as it forces him to be creative, while allowing an inherently coherent sound between the different compositions. All the arrangements on Wave Variations use a limited pallete of mostly synth-based sounds, with particular focus on keys and melodies. Each track directly influenced the next one.

Dennis has kept almost every track around three minutes in length. He states, 'I feel like a lot of ambient music (including my own) is often unnecessarily long and these small vignettes work as a nice counter to that. Don't expect long build-ups or over-extended crescendos; These are short tracks that take you straight to Elysium and then dissolve into the ether.'

He further explains the output of Wave Variations, 'Ocean tides inspired the album. I think we've all felt that sense of longing and wonder while standing at the beach, staring at the waves and gazing into the endless horizon. I think it's something that transcends all generations of people. Like the waves, these tracks leave as quickly as they arrive. I feel it's one of the most minimal records I have made, with far fewer individual sound sources at my disposal. It keeps me on my toes and forces me to deeply explore the instruments I have available to me.'

This stripped-back sound gives the album a hypnotic quality to it. Like much of Dennis' work, there is a delicate balance between melancholic melodies and rich textures, resulting in an understated yet deeply exhilarating sound. Fans of emotional, melodic ambient music should find plenty to enjoy.

Review: Earlier in the year, experienced ambient producers 36 and Zake released two different versions of the same album, "Stasis Sounds for Long Distance Space Travel", with the vinyl and cassette releases featuring totally different mixes. Happily, they've now decided to compile all of these contrasting takes on one limited-edition CD. It's well worth a listen, because in our opinion it's one of the best ambient albums of 2020 to date. The included tracks mix echoing sonic tones, drifting sound effects, drone-style aural textures, slow-burn electronic melodies, swelling, near neo-classical musical movements and the kind of immersive, sustained chords that were once the preserve of the late, great Pete Namlook.

Review: Much has changed since we last hear from Gaston Arevalo back in 2013, when we were rather impressed by his "Rollin Ballads" album on Octav. Here the often-overlooked ambient producer delivers a fine belated sequel that was apparently designed as, "a themed albuk told through the lens of an expedition diary". In effect it's a kind of imaginary soundtrack, with Arevalo setting his impeccable musical movements - think colourful but enveloping ambient chords, swelling synth-strings, slow-burn electronic melodies and barely recognisable, processed guitar sounds - to atmospheric field recordings made in Patagonia. It's a stunning combination all told, with frequently emotive results.

Review: It has been a little less than 12 months since Sam KDC bestowed his 'Omen Rising' album on fans, a record that saw the British producer refocus attention on beats - or at least rhythms. Now he's back for another full-length voyage, with ASC in tow; another UK head (although now based in the US) who, interestingly, first cut his teeth in the driving dnb scene of the late-1990s. The results of their combined efforts are as deep as they are textured, with work such as 'Awakened Senses' offering the kind of noises you'd expect to hear after descending into the abyss. Moody, atmospheric sounds glide past our ears, occasionally catching the proverbial glint of a new note before slowly receding into the unknown. 'Interoception', meanwhile, shimmers its way to the mind's eye via icy, twinkling keys.

Review: Leeds lad Chekov was one of the first artists Shanti Celeste turned to when she launched Peach Discs with Housework pal Gramrcy back in 2017. Here he returns to action with his first solo EP since and it's a bit of a beauty. He beginnings with the immersive, sunrise-ready ambient swell of "Blanked Out", where layered synthesizer motifs flutter atop the sound of what sounds like a heavily processed recording of a babbling brook, before skipping towards the dancefloor via the beefy broken techno drums, 16-bit melodies and spacey electronic sounds of "Flote". "Swerl" is a near perfect fusion of immersive chords, bittersweet motifs, chiming melodies and crunchy house drums, while "SMP" is a deliciously wonky, low-slunk chunk of lo-fi electronica that defies easy categorization.

Review: It's been four years since Is It Balearic? dons Coyote last graced our faces with an album. As you'd expect from two learned heads at the helm of such a musically rich label, their own offerings are brimming with laconic grooves and heady instrumentation, ranging from the pastoral patter of "Shimmer Dub" to the folky flex of "Ranura De Marihuana". For the most part there's a steady beat driving the loping basslines and reverbed keys, but there's also space for more ambient excursions too. "Sun Culture" is a beautiful, meditative piece to drift away to before we slip back into some more pronounced funkers to close out the B side.

Review: Pioneering ambient duo Global Communication were invited to rework the Blood Music album from Chapterhouse for this 1993 album, originally on Dedicated Records. It might technically be a remix album, then, but you'd be hard pushed to notice much of the original material left intact. Instead, in the hands of these two skilled sonic craftsmen, it becomes an hour long work over five tracks, various multi-track tapes and thematic embellishments that make for a whole new world of cinematic sound. Floating ambience is paired with slow and deep electronic beats to classic effect throughout, making it yet another masterclass from Mark Pritchard and Tom Middleton.

Review: You may not be familiar with avant-garde composer Valentina Goncharova, but this incredible collection of rare home recordings is enough to answer any questions you might have as to how mind-blowing her work is. The sort of artist who needs to flee the Leningrad Conservatoire in order to have the space and freedom to fully explore ideas. Combining elements of musique concrete, drone, ambient and a kind of lo-fi classical, this is an expression of place - sanctuary of the home - and its ability to offer protection from creative oppressors. Using vocal mantras, curious refrains, amplified and distorted strings (cello in particular), you really get a sense of not only the where but the how behind these arrangements. Hushed but dense, they draw the listener in with surprising speed, so before you know it you're right there in that domestic studio watching a genius at work.

Review: Takashi Kokubo makes archetypal Japanese ambient, new age and experimental synth sounds. But not only that, he also created the nationally-used mobile phone earthquake alert sound and designed credit card payment jingles that pervade all of Japanese society. His sound, then, is very much the sound of the Far East. It has been that way since at least this album came out back in 1985. It's a classic of the genre, hard to find and hugely expensive if you do. This full scale reissue sinks you into his world of distant chimes, eerie chords and spring-time soundtracking that is pure as ice.

Review: To label this collection of sonic innovations 'ambient' kind of misses the point. Yes, the record quickly creates an ambience, but the genre itself usually implies a reliance on harmonisation and a heavy leaning towards futurism, or at least synthdom, whereas what we have here is something quite difference. Like listening to a full orchestra tune up, before diving into the forgotten culture of some long lost civilisation. 'Paper Tigers' is a case in point, jangly guitar refrains apparently suspended on a knife edge of complex noise. It's a contrast to both 'A New Story', the preceding opener that acts as gentile warm up, and the vocal collage of 'Ta Sha Si Le Ta', where harmonised voice lines combine to develop an air of intense but hushed atmosphere. Add twinkling sleigh bells and elongated strings of 'Golden Calf', and the tap-drop percussive tension on 'Interval', and you've got a real adventure waiting.

Review: Two Past Inside the Present artists that have previously released works on the PITP label come together for this anonymous split ep. 19 minutes of lush, slow-moving ambient trails. With this record we want listeners to go in blind, without ego or expectation, with the sole focus on what truly matters: the music. The artists and titles will remain anonymous until the vinyl sells out and then we will reveal all.

Review: The launch of the Love Record Stores project has inspired Mute to reissue each of Stefan Betke's first three albums as Pole on coloured vinyl. First-up is his 1998 debut album, "1", which this time round appears on navy blue wax. While Betke successfully refined his sound over the years that followed, "1" was where he unveiled his trademark glitch-dub style for the very first time. It remains a must-check classic: a hazy, insatiably crackly and spaced-out affair that re-imagines electronic dub as an otherworldly amalgam of ambient, electronica, sound collage, sample-heavy sonic textures and the deep basslines/echoing electronics more often associated with dub techno.

Review: Given The Primitive Painter would go on to become Alter Ego it should come as no surprise to anyone that this self titled debut from 1994 still sounds incredibly polished, and manages to hit a multitude of electronic notes in one very impressive swoop - some melancholic, some otherworldly, others punchy and direct. Re-releases like this are enough to convince even the most cynical first-pressing militants of the value in re-releasing. Why shouldn't a new generation of heads be won over by the beautiful acid ravescape painted by 'A Pagan Place', the slamming toybox percussion of 'Click Song', the emotionally charged euphoric downtempo joy of appropriately-titled 'Hope' or the retro futurism of electro-stepper 'Levitation'? As essential today as it would have been 25 years ago.

Review: Creamy Encouraging Mystical Mantras.