ambient

Krysalisound

Sometimes an album works so inspiring that a lot of words flow through my keyboard without actually describing the album itself. This album, a remastered reissue of  Paw Grabowski's 2015 release, came in for review a while ago. Yet, instead of become the subject of a review, it became the musical guide for the opening scene of my new book, or at least for the atmosphere. While these six gloomy but beautiful ambient pieces floated through my speakers, my mind wondered off and inspiration came in huge numbers. So for that,  Paw Grabowski, thank you. Now, let's go into the music itself, because that is what we're here for, isn't it?


Actually, this review could be very short. 'The Forest Is Sleeping Within The Trees' is a six track album, built around the piano and the pump organ. One of the keywords here is "minimalism" as the sounds of both instruments seem to dance with and around one another. Fans of artists like William Basinski , Tim Hecker or Stars Of The Lid will easily appreciate these six tunes. The whole thing is gloomy, driving on looping organs and quite often repetitive piano touches. The latter give the music a neat sense of pulsation.

It's not easy to select a favorite track, perhaps it's 'Part 1', a somewhat rhythmic and enticing piece of music. 'Part 2' is more experimental, a bit harsher. It still wanders through ambient landscapes, but feels rougher. 'Part 3' is dreamy and seductive while 'Part 4' drags the listening along dark drones and eerie soundscapes. The others are up to you to discover and I really recommend checking out this gem. Piano ambient doesn't often come this narrative and immersive, I can tell you that!!!


Serge

drone / ambient

death metal / grindcore

death industrial / dark ambient

Exabyss Records

post rock / ambient / electronic

ambient / classical

funeral doom

gothic rock / alternative / metal

drone / ambient / folk

dark ambient 

alternative rock / funk rock

facebook

indie / dreampop

industrial / electronic

Perc Trax

​Serge (2 & 3 by Patsker)

modern classical

Piano Fantasia is an album released in November 1st, by Japanese post classic pianist Yuki Murata. Almost forty three minutes long, the record contains twelve relatively short pieces: clammbon, forgotten carousel, dear my cat, utopia, red owl, elephant dance, bird sings a lullaby, melody, ice flower, phosphorescent, flying tricycle and good-bye, hello. Like fragmentary surreal pieces that fly over colorful universes of short, but somewhat disdainful and quiet sentences, Yuki Murata’s style resonates over her own subtle and discreet, though marvelous exponential incandescence, flirting with a sophisticated, but delicate and expansive minimalism, in the elegant evanescence of efficient melodies, that acts extravagantly as an everlasting rhapsody of epic personal fury, though healing as gracefully as a butterfly about to proceed on its first flight. 

With the fantasy of a glorious universe of sentimental tenderness, the music of Yuki Murata is the excellence of a perfect and dynamic technique in action, despite the fact that the strength of her soul predominates, talking through the melodies in an ardently spontaneous, though delicate flavor; with a general serenity that sometimes flirts with melancholy, her style is completely destitute of superficial and redundant extravaganza. She goes direct to the point, but with such a graceful and fabulous splendor, that you feel the simple elegance of the harmonies floating through the endless storms of her naturally creative output. Slowly, these wonderful symphonies of serenity reveals a sincere, but majestic sonorous cohesion, that keeps fragmenting oceans of sensibilities deep down the anatomy of a mournful restless spirit. 

With graceful sonatas and sentimental cantilenas that absorb, but at the same time expose a lugubrious atmosphere of intuitive delicacy, the sonorous densities that comes out of the songs converge altogether to the axis of its essentially lucid, pungent and vivacious atmospheric peripheries, to gently inspire the infinite horizon of musical possibilities that delightfully revolves around the listener to become its own allegoric universe of colorful vastness, reinstating over its elements the glorious majesty displayed by a virtuous and gracious technique. 

Sidelined by a lucid perception of poetic vitality, and a proverbial grace of harmonious delicacy, Yuki Murata’s Piano Fantasia is a mellifluent cosmogony of latent splendor; a great collection of symphonies, where an abundant correlation of spectacular beauty is embraced by the conscious exuberance of a dispersive mosaic of proficient melodies, marvelously designed and arranged altogether to reinvent the universe, in a microcosm of ephemeral, but consistent delight. 



Wagner

ambient

A Quiet Divide is an album released on October 5, by New Zealander artist Rhian Sheehan. A dense and profound ambient music album, the record has
Thirteen tracks: Elegy for the Past, The Absence of You, Lost Letters, Soma Dreams, Between Us and the Dying Starlight, We Danced Under a Broken Sky, Toward the Sun, Last Time We Spoke, Atlas, Someplace, All Who Remain, April and 1982. With a lucid and lugubrious, but also calm and placid serenity, the overall style of the artist is gracefully organic, splendorous and beautiful, definitely beyond the constellations of an ordinary musical twilight. With harmonies that integrates thoughts and emotions into a singular universe of profoundly humane sensibility, the music of Rhian Sheehan is a marvelous experience for the sensitivity of our nature, as propitiates to the listener the opportunity to undergone a delicate journey throughout the vastness of its own perceptions, to discover a little more about the personal galaxies that sleeps inside the empty abscesses of humankind’s omniscient collective dreams. 

With a light, but horizontal musicality that sleeps inside the painful road of memories, the sound of this fabulous work is gentile and soft, and invites the listener to stay in a corner of eternity that is simple, familiar and friendly. Without exacerbated or majestic ambitions, the style derives its sensibility from the most pure desires of the human nature, converting into sound the vicissitudes of its translucent and sincere aspirations, that fragrantly exposes on the nudity of its harmonies the most fragile elements of its densely poetic qualities.

Sidelined to a ghostly atmosphere, there is a warm that comes closer to the soul, as the album slowly and warmly progresses. Deciphering the enigmas of exhausted empty days – but understanding the gratitude necessary for the human mind to redeem itself –, Rhian Sheehan seeks beyond the salutary reverences of the sound its inherent value, to elaborate a symphony where everything can converge to an everlasting love, as the vital components of his music breaths, searching vividly for life, and interacts with the ardent splendor of an infinite day of happiness, that will never fade away. This revolves gently in the mind, and perpetuates a cycle of sonorous resignation, where everything is destined to be assimilated into an everlasting state of rapture, after days lost in a tornado of increasing anxiety.       

A beautiful music that oversees its own paradigm, sometimes reluctant, sometimes peaceful and silent, A Quiet Divide is definitely a marvelous and instigating album. With a peculiar and dense atmosphere, Rhian Sheehan gives life to a somewhat stagnant style, and transforms the most placid aspects of its latent dormancy in a serene, vigorous and glorious dream, that will agitate the sensibilities of your existence for all the days to come. 


Wagner

post rock / neoclassical / ambient

Ashes of the Past is an album released on May 16, by Iranian post rock/neoclassical ambient group Crows in the rain. An epic, dense and very colorful masterpiece, a little more than two hours in length, with eleven extensive tracks, the work is very long. The songs are the following: Beyond The Flying Mountains, Meteorite Shower, Lights In Front Of A Dead Sea, For A World That Sounds Like It's Meaning, She, Requiem For A Dreamer, 12/26, Cosmic Dawn, Running Through Paradoxical Dreams (Live in Azadi Tower), I Will Build The Future On The Ashes Of Past Memories and Rain Will Come. With lucid, proverbial and vivid peculiarities, that really deserves a profound appreciation, Ashes of the Past is a very slow, smooth, easy listening and reflexive album, that gently invites the listener to embark almost literally in a sensitive journey to another dimension – to a very secretive, dormant and singular continent of existence – to rest in some place where the divinities of nature, usually excessively distant from the ordinary grievances of the present, finally appear in abundance, to refresh your approach on life.   

With exceedingly soft and outspoken harmonies, the work seems to depart from the unexpected infinity of its inherent and soft nature; here, the listener has to participate in the cinematic perceptions of the sensibility of the music, as the sound evolves from one personal universe to another, denoting the omniscient ambivalence of its melodic purposes with an almost restless and deliberate plausibility. With straightforward serenity and calmness, the music present on Ashes of the Past is severely relevant within its own perspective, as it grows from a sidereal necessity that understands – and explores with subtle intelligence, talent and patience – the perfection of the sound hidden in the silent veracity of harmonious audacities.     

With a sound that oscillates between the verges of post rock, neoclassical and ambient – but probably doesn’t bothering at all with labels and categories – the ecstatic and gracious music of Crows in the rain is a discreet journey into the most esoteric areas of infinity. Deeply resurfacing on harmonious conjunctures that exhibits at the twilight of its own reverberation the continuous atmosphere of a placid existential intuition, the style of the group is severely expansive and impulsive, but restrained at the silence of its own enigmatic sonorous frontiers. Astoundingly innovative and fearlessly original, Crows in the rain fulfills at the axis of its imaginary devices the resolution of their own genuine sonorous affability.  

Despite the general simplicity on the structure of the music, the style of the group is intriguing and profoundly creative. Working some minimalist tendencies as well, their technical competence and timing also highlights itself strongly, denoting for the composition of this work a whimsical dedication, whose final result certainly advocates the excellence of their phenomenal, but exceedingly dilapidated qualities.  
 
Despite the fact that Ashes of the Past is a very beautiful album, it’s more recommended to audiences who already enjoy a great familiarity with the genre. As the rhythm of the album is severely calm and slow, it certainly will sound monotonous for people who aren’t used to this kind of music. Nevertheless, for its entire run, Ashes of the Past resounded the tempestuous brilliance of its formidable creativity and originality, certainly deserving a special place of honor on the history of ambient rock music. 


Wagner

ambient / drone

industrial / metal / drum & bass

classical

metal

grindcore / crust

ambient / techno

new wave / alternative rock

black metal

bandcamp

black metal

classical / post rock / jazz

facebook

drone doom

hard rock / metal

black metal / noise

dark jazz

Serge

classical / ambient

I had a dream last night. I was playing the piano in an old jazz club, one that looked like the ones from twenties movies. There was a girl too, wearing a red dress. She was standing behind the microphone with her eyes closed. It all felt so natural. Playing this piano seemed so easy, that is why I knew it was only a dream. Yet, I tried to remember the melody, the order of the keys. I can actually play the piano a little bit so who knows, maybe one day I'll recreate the song from my dream and play it in an old jazz club. It would be nice but there are people who can do far greater things with this almost divine instrument, people like Keith Kenniff for example.

One half of Mint Julep and sole member of Helios, Keith Kenniff is no stranger to the world of ambient, post rock and modern classical music. Since 2001, Kenniff releases new work and tours the globe on a regular basis, with good reason too. He is one of those artists that can set the mood with only a touch on the keys. That is what he does on 'Occasus', the new Goldmund album, set to be released in April. With a minimal sound, balancing between classical music and electronic ambient, Kenniff gently turns your room into that old jazz club and I couldn't be happier about it.

'Occasus' contains fifteen tracks, all following the path of piano melodies and minimal ambient soundscapes. In that aspect, it is probably safe to say that Goldmund sails the same vast but calm waters as Olafur Arnalds, A Winged Victory For The Sullen and Max Richter. My favorite tracks here are 'Breaking',  'Circle' and the breathtaking ambient piece 'Terrarium' but I'm sure every fan of dreamy ambient can easily appreciate this. So, without further ado, I think it's time for you to go over to Goldmund's bandcamp page and pre-order this album. Trust me, you won't be disappointed.


​Serge

ambient / classical

It's strange. During the day, I usually throw a massive amount of music into my WinAmp (yes, I'm old school), click the shuffle-button and press play. Then, all different kinds of music start playing, from ambient over jazz and post rock to techno, black metal and drum & bass.

However, sometimes I promptly shut WinAmp down, only because somewhere in this building or the one next door, somebody is playing the piano. I don't know who it is. I mostly don't know what he or she plays but all sounds must fade away when that instrument resonates through the walls.

It's almost miraculous how such a big and imposing instrument can express so much solitude. The gentle sound of the hammers on the strings can move almost any person to tears. And that certainly counts for the music Gianluca Piacenza creates. I reviewed his previous record, 'Dream' back in 2015 (read - and ignore the annoying ad, we don't do that anymore). Now he returns with 'The Road To Home', a ten tracks piano album that is too beautiful to ignore.

The album opens with the gloomy track 'Dark Light' which immediately sets the tone. The music follows the same path as on 'Dream', being slow, lingering pieces of solo piano. A bit romantic, a bit nostalgic and a bit emotional but mostly soothing and dreamy. From then on, the album calmy moves forward, highlighting in the mesmerizing piano-ambient piece 'Angels', and obviously a few times more after that.

I'm not sure if there is anything else to say about this album. It's simply filled with beautiful music, nothing more, nothing less. If you are a fan of the piano and people who have great affinity with that instrument, there is no need to doubt. If you like music by people like Arnalds, Frahm, Schubert and Beethoven, here are some new breathtaking melodies to accompany you through the upcoming spring evenings.


​Serge

ambient / classical

Nobody knows for sure what happens after this life is over. Yet, people have always had ideas about it. Some people believe in heaven and hell while others prefer reincarnation. Still others seem to think that the lights go out and that nothing will happen after we die.

Still, it is a scientific fact that whoever dies eventually becomes a part of nature again. Our flesh, our bones, every single cell in our body will disappear and provide food and thus energy to new forms of life. Like a forest that covers a battlefield. It seems like will well forever be a part of mother nature.

Metsänpeitto (lit. 'covered by forest') is a Finnish folk belief that one can become lost in the forest and be transported into another reality; one where the forest is timeless, reversed and distorted. Forest have always had a certain attraction to people and therefore also to their beliefs. Based on that belief, 'Metsänpeitto' is the new opus by violinist/composer Meriheini Luoto. Graduated at the Sibelius Academy in 2016, Luoto has a fresh and exciting view on classical music, folk and ambient and this album is a brilliant statement of that vision.

This album is a rather minimal blend of classical music and experimental ambient. The violin in the central instrument, here and there enhanced with voices, percussion of whistles. Although there are some uptempo and rather joyful folk music passages to be found, the majority of the music on this album is slow, lingering and intriguing. In five tracks, Luoto takes the listener on a strange but exciting journey, something I can always appreciate.

So, who to recommend this album to? Well, I think the fans of avant garde, out of the ordinary music will certainly appreciate this. Fans of Arvo Pärt, Kronos Quartet, Kuro, Henryk Górecki and even Dmitri Shostakovich might want to give this album a good listen, but also fans of (dark) jazz, noise and Nordic ambient. I admit, it can get a bit weird, unconventional and uncomfortable at times but then again, you're not reading articles on Merchants Of Air for pop music references, are you? So yes, check it out. It's something else which is almost always interesting.


​Serge

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post rock / psychedelic

By now, most people who visit our website regularly should know that Belgium is a musical nation. I have written several articles about it and I have been glorifying the talent in our little country numerous times. I've seen more Belgian bands perform than all other countries combined. My book is loaded with bands, mostly Belgian ones. I have no idea how many have appeared here and I certainly don't know how many will come up in the future. New bands enter my attention span on an almost daily basis. Only a few days ago, I got acquainted with the album I'm about to review here, an album which comes from a band I did not know yet.

Their band name is Nile On Wax, but until recently they were known as Nox. The band consists of Catherine Graindorge (violin, viola), David Christophe (bass, double bass) and Elie Rabinovitch (drums). They live and work in Brussels. As Nox, they released two albums, plus the music for the dance recital 'Charleroi Dances' and movies by Hal Harley and Karim Ouelhaj. That is quite an impressive oeuvre already but, like I mentioned, for me Nile On Wax is something completely new. 

The band claims that their music is a blend of cinematic post rock and psychedelic rock and perhaps those were indeed the main influences for Nile On Wax. Yet, from listening to these six tracks, I think that there is a lot more going on. Of course, the sound of the violin and the effects give the whole thing a classical/ambient touch and the bass adds a hint of krautrock. Yet, when the drums come in, I can't help but suspect a history in jazz. Psychedelic? Not so much but nonetheless breathtakingly beautiful instrumental music.

Because of the tribal percussion, closer and title track 'Bell Dogs' is my favorite piece of music on this album, but I can assure you that the whole thing is worth listening to. It opens with 'Rhapsody', a splendid modern day jazz tune which reminds me of acts like Yodok III, be it more melodic. From then on, without toning down on quality, the entire album gently floats through the speakers. While listening to 'Nightride', I imagined Nile On Wax playing at Dunk! Festival next year. I would love to witness this live. So obviously and without any form of hesitation, this is a massively recommended album to post rockers, jazz fans and classical music crossover people.


​Serge