Search results: Aqua

Review: Lawrence English's album Colours of Air on Kranky finds him hooking up with fellow composer loscil aka Scott Morgan. The pair find a perfect sweet spot between their respective backgrounds as they work up absorbing ambient sounds from a collection of recordings of a century-old pipe organ that lives in the Old Museum in Brisbane, Australia. The source recordings were then processed, transformed, and elevated into these absorbing soundscapes where timbre, spatial fluctuation and swelling drones all sweep you off your feet. It is a truly original and captivating piece of work.

Review: XAO is back on his long-term label Canvas with another scintillating new album, Wirehead. It is his second following the head tuning 2019 debut Eternal Care Unit and it comes with liquid metal surfaces, chrome sheen and wispy sound design that is utterly futuristic. Though very much a clean digital album laden with video game FX and contemporary sound design, there is warmth and humanity in these tracks. Delayed percussion, guitar fuzz, celestial chords and rich, hearty bass all make it so as techno, IDM and electro are all fused together.

Review: The ambient fan's favourite businessman and wandering soul, Martin Glass, presents a weary, cathartic series of wistful Balearic sketches in the vein of FSOL, the caretaker and the work of more fresh faced contenders like SSIEGE. Composed during a stay at 'a celebrity health resort in the hills beyond Hollywood', Magic Mountain unfurls over 13 balmy, benzo'd tracks, each named to evoke a musing, observation, or group wellness activity which our protagonist takes part in, compulsive cognac sipping included.
Particularly enjoyable pursuits include Glass' 'Morning Walk with Marlene Dietrich', which plugs away at a steady beach-tempo plod, while cirrus wisps of synthesizer stretch heavy across the horizon, and the poignant 'Dean Martin's Blizzard Dreams'; presumably inspired by a conversation with the King of Cool himself about his oneiric weather patterns. The delicate, pointilist 'Cognac at the Esalen Lounge' is an aural analogy for Glass' barside ennui, sounding like oversized ice cubes colliding in a wobble glass and the retreat culminates in the rollicking 'Carnival of the Jetsetters'; a misty-eyed goodbye to the other sedated participants, who are doubtless late for their next long-haul. Ride it out!

Review: Heavyweight ambient partnerships don't come much bigger than Lawrence English and Loscil, who pool their considerable resources into this majestic album for Kranky. If you're familiar with Loscil's shimmering, sweetly synthetic sound, you'll be very happy with the grandiose blooms of undulating colour bleeding out of 'Cyan', while English's affinity for subtlety comes to the fore on 'Aqua'. The approach for the album was centred around a century-old pipe organ at the Old Museum in Brisbane, but of course there's been a lot of work done on the original sound sources. There's no great tussle between the respective artists - their sound practices merge beautifully, rendering an essential addition to both of their considerable catalogues.