Hosts Of Living Forms cassette

Having debuted in mid-2021 with a cassette-only mini-album, the admirable but hard-to-find Sell, mysterious, Atlanta-based ambient outfit The Lifted Index delivers its debut album proper on Past Inside The Present. Described by its creators as "a mediation on our interconnected world", Hosts of Living Form was reportedly inspired by a combination of the life cycle of plant life (in their words, "death, decay, decomposition, growth"). Musically, it's a quietly picturesque affair in which ambient electronics, crackling aural textures, effects-laden pianos and the Duratti Column style guitar sounds ebb and flow to create fluid, organic soundscapes. It's all quietly impressive, but at its finest - such as on 'In Stones & Trees, The Bones of Things', and the lilting 'Eluvium Repose' - the album is genuinely breath-taking.