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Wind and Wire |
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R E V I E W |
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MATTHEW FLORIANZ (LIQUID MORPHINE) Grijs Gebied H/S Recordings (2001) |
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review by Bill Binkelman It's hard to believe that an ambient album as good as Grijs Gebied from Matthew Florianz (Liquid Morphine) got so little buzz (or maybe I just didn't read it). The CD offers up ten tracks of imaginative, even surreal at times, floating and drone ambience. Since the music here can be darkly beautiful at times, a person can be excused if he/she just floats away into the netherzone and stops trying to analyze what one is hearing (can you tell where I am going with this?). Yes, Grijs Gebeid is one of "those" recordings, i.e. an album that is vexing to the reviewer who likes it. Just when I start to delve into the inner workings of the music on this CD, it casts its spell, weaves its web - in short, it mesmerizes me with the smoky drones, the swirling textures, and the church organ-like washes that all conspire to envelop my mind and make it difficult (if not impossible) to "concentrate" on the music. Most of what is on this CD is dark to semi-dark music. It's not Stalker-like, though, probably owing to the warmth of those organ-like textures and the relative lack of what I would label either noise or dissonance. Besides being mysterious (or dark if you prefer), the music also has a sad or even funereal feel to it at times. The end of the track "schaduwrijk" would be perfect background music for the scene in The Two Towers where the elves are departing Rivendell (how's that for free-associating to a set image?). Florianz is assisted on various pieces by an assortment of other people on voice, samples, and perhaps more as well. There is no instrumentation listed, so I can't tell you specifically how Florianz created the drones, bell-like tones, rumblings, and those wonderful organ chords. Many of the tracks here are on the quiet side - headphones are recommended unless you listen to this in a very still environment with no outside noises. "dageraad" builds at a glacier pace, beginning with a cold sparsity and gradually folding in more musical elements that color the song in icy cool blues. "glasswind" has a touch of experimentalism to it, with its eerie glistening noise distortions that come and go, amid a background of sumbling drones. You'll be tempted to think that the darkness of the cut is erased by the next one, "maalstroom," with its minimal yet warm drones that begin the song, but soon afterwards the whirlpool of tones and synth effects begins to build and eerieness overtakes you. Thankfully, things calm down on the Tim Story-like "nakalm," a track that has a strong sense of melancholy to it, with minimal echoed piano and guitar. The Tim Story comparison soon falls away as the cut becomes more of a drone piece, but the same pervasive sadness remains. At this point there is still thirty minutes left on the album (three more cuts), but I want to leave something for you to discover on your own. The rest of the pieces fluctuate from whispy shadowy ambience wafting in the air to more substantial slices of electronic-laced soundscapes, featuring multiple layers of music and effects. Fans of dark (but not too dark) ambient music and possibly spacemusic fans (who don't need Jonn Serrie-ish synths leading the way) would, I expect, enjoy the territory that Florianz explores throughout the sixty-eight minutes of Grijs Gebied. As drone ambient music goes, this is one of the better efforts I've heard, owing to its mixture of textures and tones, as well as the flashes of overt musicality (I love those organ sounds). As background listening, (and this is a failing of many drone-style recordings) the nuance and subtleties will be lost, but as sonic wallpaper, you could do much worse, too. I'd still opt for the headphones on this one, though. |
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