This has to be one of the most poorly tagged albums I have ever encountered on Bandcamp, and I’m happy for it. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I first played Quick Dreams, a release by Georgian composer Gacha Bakradze, but I knew about 20 second into it that it wasn’t going to be techno or house. It’s definitely an ambient record, and quite a shimmery and pretty one as well, but you find acoustic guitar, rock-ish structures, and a very calm, warm air around this disc.
Ambient
[Music] Ataşehir – AVM
Ambient as a cool breeze meeting a calming shopping experience. Oxymoronic, I know, but humor me a bit.
This description fits this release from Ataşehir (an alias of the ever-wonderful project and friend to this blog, Sumatran Black). AVM in a Turkish acronym for alışveriş merkezi, which translates into supermarket or shopping mall, though I might be mistaken. There is a nearly vaporwave aesthetic to their music in this release. It’s ambient, of course, but spiced with a touch of 80s or 90s cheese, the sort you may have encountered wandering in a mall 30 or 40 years ago. Modern Muzak. The music of my youth spent in elevators, escalators and fast food courts. Very pleasant, indeed.
[Music] RRUFF – Impresiones
RRUFF are a band based in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. Though they are tagged as “dungeon-synth,” there is a dark, rather pleasant, atmospheric, air about this two-track album. The work seems to come from a performance-oriented project focused on the ideas of Joan Fontcuberta regarding the state of photography and image.
From the band’s Bandcamp page:
Today photographs have ceased to be a memory to be ephemeral. The massification of photography has led us to a new situation in which it is not so important to own as to share. We live or perceive through the screens, which, like the shadows of Plato, are now our access to reality.
Perhaps it is because she was on my mind today, but the second track reminds me of American composer Pauline Oliveros, of blessed memory. RRUFF are in good company.
[Music] Yann Rouquet – The Silent North EP
Yann Rouquet is a composer out of Paris, France, who surprised me with a very short, but very relaxed, subdued and rather charming EP of ambient music with a cinematic bent. There seems to be a lot of it around, and I quite like that.
I look forward to hearing Yann develop these concepts further into longer albums.
[Music] aswekeepsearching – Sleep
A nice, mellow surprise out of India. aswekeepsearching are a post-rock band out of Pune. The band’s sound reminds me of something with a calming, cinematic feel which is complemented with a rock music structure underneath. Quite enjoyable.
[Music] Zan Hoffman & Hubert Heathertoes – Kaunastic Relapse of Idiosyncrasies: The Baltic Innoculation and other wayward ditties
Zan Hoffman and Hubert Heathertoes have been featured twice on this blog before (see here and here), and each time, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by their output. The good lads continue their tradition of splicing together drone, field recordings, and an aura of pleasantly calming weirdness together for well over an hour of headphone bliss.
[Music] Departure Street – Two Islands in the Heart
Departure Street is American/French guitarist Allan J. Kimmel. Reading his bio on the Bandcamp release page, he calls his work neo-folk. I thought it a strange term, as I normally associate it with dark bands who worked with music that would set well with fans of bands like Death In June, Current 93 and the like. Giving this a couple of listens, perhaps there is some connection there. What I hear a bit more strongly is a sound that compares well with contemporary guitarists like Cousin Silas. This has floaty, pleasant feel to it. Worth a third or fourth listen, definitely.
From Allan’s Bandcamp page:
Departure Street, AKA Allan J. Kimmel, creates tranquil electric guitar meditations that sprawl and explore like the hungry tendrils of an aggressive ivy.
Kimmel, who hails from both America and France, has filled this record with nothing but vividly surreal instrumental soundscapes, which are comprised purely of his multi-tracked and effects-laden solo guitar. Across the record’s nine tracks, Kimmel takes his unique brand of psychedelic loner-folk, and stirs in elements of reverb-heavy ambient music, cosmic American primitivism and even some Middle Eastern folk traditions. The resulting brew is a heady yet mellow mix that glides along with a pleasant ease.
While the album feels like one large suite, “Ascension” is certainly a highlight. David Gilmour-esque slide guitar coasts through slow waves of spacey, repetitive riffs, all while Kimmel laces melancholic solos across the entirety of the piece. There’s a heavy atmosphere in “Ascension,” and it makes you think about people and places that you’re nostalgic for, or pleasant dreams that you’ve once had. It’s certainly a comforting recording, but there is some sort of loss hidden just below the surface.
Two Islands in the Heart is a complex record despite its minimalist approach, and it’s an unexpectedly emotionally charged one, as well. If you are a fan of Steve Palmer’s latest record, Cian Nugent or David Grubbs, then you need this album.
[Music] Janne Hanhisuanto – Ambient Collection 2020
Janne Hanhisuanto is an ambient music composer out of Finland. His soundscapes are about as bleak as his homeland. What I enjoy most about his work is that it hovers somewhere between 5 and 9 minutes, and it gives one time to really let the mind enjoy each and every pulse of this work. I’m looking forward to hearing more from Janne soon.
[Music] This Place to Be, by Steve Roach
How can you go wrong with Steve Roach? His music gives such bliss.
A free (Name Your Own Price) for now download from Mr. Roach
This Place To Be centers in on a sweet spot of serenity with a sense of perfect weightlessness and contentment, nowhere else to be but here.
CD with download and name your price for the a few days on the digital version.
After the run of concerts and the wide range of dynamic releases over the past few years, I am feeling deeply drawn towards a return to home and to my soul tone zone of pure immersion, deep atmospherics and textural healing. That is the best way to describe this work and the place I need to be.
Steve – May 27, 2016
Released May 27, 2016
So . . . sitting around in #QuaratineLife I downloaded this – and then began to tinker with it. I took 2 long sections of the composition, stretched them x…
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[Music] Virus (Italy) – Eudaimonia
This was a very pleasant surprise. Virus is, perhaps, not the best choice of band name only because there are so many great bands (including a legendary Austrian one I whose album I was listening to today) who share the monicker, but because it is about as far away from the music as possible.
The music claims to be influenced by bands like Sigur Rós, but I hear elements of New Order, some 80’s funk and pop, and a nearly shoegaze-meets-Gospel music feel.
Quite good!