CRAIG PADILLA

Genesis

Spotted Peccary (2004)

For a guy who professes not to care much for newer forms of Berlin School EM, I certainly find myself listening to and enjoying much of it. At the forefront of this wave of new artists is Craig Padilla whose <i>Vostok</i> was one of my favorites of 2002--a chilled, icy landscape; an hour of drifting ice floe synths. Padilla returns with his latest for the Spotted Peccary label, <i>Genesis</i>. At first listen, <i>Genesis</i> is far, far different from the somewhat static and ambient environs of <i>Vostok</i>--this is the kinetic, cosmic Padilla, very much in the style of past German electronic music, but new, fresh and vibrant in sound.<p>

The monumental "Genesis" opens the album, a twenty-minute frenzy of shifting sequencers. Bold sequences bubble to the surface, a mixture of both classic synthwork in the Michael Hoenig style and ambient-techno atmospherics that would not be out of place on an Irresistable Force album. Gusty wind and oceanic sounds give the track an ethereal quality, complimenting the charged and exciting phasing of synth sequences rather unusually. This is beautiful material, on par with "Departure from the Northern Wasteland" by the before-mentioned Hoenig and "Toward the Dream" on Steve Roach's masterful <i>Dreamtime Return</i>--a searing whirlwind of extremely emotional, yet classic in feel, electronic music. "Moon Tides" calms the atmosphere down with bell tones and melancholy synth pads. A lone piano melody intones now, and we have returned to that misty shore Ashra works such as <i>New Age of Earth</i> occupy--twilit, haunting, the far horizon within view. At the seven minute mark, a mellotron enters the scene, echoing <i>Stratosfear</i>. The percolating sequence that follows is delightful, propelling the music along while maintaining the haunting ambient flavor of the earlier sections of the track. "Moon Tides" finishes up like classic Tangerine Dream, a lovely reminder of why we were so enamored with electronic music in the first place.<p>

Next up is "Ascension," another sweeping ambient piece featuring the unlikely addition of guitar playing that vaguely echoes Ennio Morricone. Synth-wind phasing and desolate planets are recalled, and when the synth harmonics sweep in, we are smack dab in Klaus Schulze's <i>Timewind</i> rewritten and updated for 2004. Perhaps the sounds and contexts here ape Schulze a little too closely, but I'm the kind of listener who got chills anyway, just as I did when I first heard <i>Timewind</i>. This track, though modern, echoes all the great kosmiche classics of yesterday, without seeming hackneyed or a recapitulation of what's been done before. The final track, "Message from Within," is the most modern of space music, rather like a meatier and less flighty Jonn Serrie. Interstellar winds and lovely synthwork color the sky, somehow wistful, as a stargazer might look at the heavens knowing that in all likelihood he will never get <i>out there</i>--continuing to gaze, nonetheless. This, the longest track on the album, is masterful; the kind of space music you'd love to listen to for an entire evening under the stars in your own neighborhood, a celestial brotherhood present wherever you happen to be. It changes gradually, eventually introducing a down-tempo sequence, morphing almost continuously till the end, which comes all too soon.<p>

To put it briefly, Craig Padilla has crafted his masterpiece with <i>Genesis</i>. Everything about this album has "new classic" written all over it. I'm unable to put a finger on just why most of the modern artists of Berlin School electronic music don't satisfy me--obviously, it's not the style itself, because Padilla's album has hit all the right notes and spots for <i>this</i> listener. Certainly, the album contains nothing we haven't heard before, but I think that's missing the point. While <i>Genesis</i> breaks no new ground, it does manage to freshen and revitalize an often slavishly imitated style of music, instilling it with the same joy we felt when we heard the originators' lauded works. While fans of pure ambient music will find this album a touch too active or too light for their tastes, I heartily recommend <i>Genesis</i> to all who look back on the "Golden Age" of synth-based electronic music with nostalgia. A fine effort.

go back to the top of this page

IXOHOXI

Ambient Tone Poems II

self-released (2003)

Mysterious ambient artist IXOHOXI last appeared on these shores with his fine collaboration with Denver ambient artist Numina: Starfarer's Tales, Vol. 1. Since then, both artists have stayed prolific, continually self-releasing material of an extremely ambient nature. Ixohoxi's series of atmospheric ambient discs, "Ambient Tone Poems" is already up to its third installment at the time of writing--I have the pleasure of reviewing the second volume, which proves, once and for all, that Ixohoxi is not an artist easily pigeon-holed.

"Amazonia Orthoptera Nymph Molts" begins the collection in a suitably environmental fashion, considering the title. Mysterious night-noises, the chittering of crickets, and the din of what I imagine to be cicadas, meld with other-worldly synth-sweeps that glide breathlessly along. Electronic shakers punctuate the ambience every so often, invoking a Jorge Reyes-styled tribal mood. The swirling storm of sound is peaceful, yet busy, until a bubbling ambient-techno groove pierces the veil of ambience. This groove is straight out of the Silent catalog, with unusual, textured synth backgrounds that keep the decidedly modern bent of the track earthed in the earlier ambience. Eventually, the atmospheric sounds dissipate, leaving only the groove behind, itself fading out soon thereafter. Next, "Soft Light and Temple Birds" continues the mid-nineties Silent tone with psychedelic synth tones and highly synthetic percussion, similar to the work of Alpha Wave Movement. A bowed, Japanese-sounding instrument begins lightly soloing along with the synthwork creating a strange combination of the natural and artificial, as if the temple of the title is nestled deep within a bustling city, a heart of peace within the chaos. The seemingly random synth-sequence tends to grate over the track's nearly ten minute length, but the lovely synth-pads cascading in the background add much to the equation. Perhaps not the strongest track on the album, in part due to the out-of-place soloing and somewhat static sequence. "Cetaceans" is next, a shimmering of synth-tones, decidedly watery in nature. These sea sounds submerge completely, revealing the hooning of whalesong, distorted under the ocean's waves. A piano melody appears from nowhere, accented by lovely synth pads. This track veers into new age territory, dwelling in a lighter, sunnier zone of influence. The end of the track plumbs ever deeper into strange, wholly synthetic, environs, an unusual transition, and perhaps not the most effective, as it breaks the spell rather decisively. "Small Mammal REM Cycle" is reminiscent of a certain Pink Floyd track with a similar title, with shrieking and unusual animal sounds combined with sonorous bell tones and odd synth noises that would not be out of place on a Ron Geesin record. The bells' sustain has been seriously messed with, and we're in some lysergic woodland, with a temple not far off. This, the longest track on the album, stays fairly static, and is all the stronger for it. The unusual synth textures and various bell noises come together in an effectively trippy way; disorienting, but not uncomfortable to listen to. It's a vibrating, forest paradise, with a little bit of menace just out of the field of view. It's also, in my opinion, the best track on the album. Finally, "Incandescent Blue Morpho" returns to more familiar ambient territory: a fairly standard atmospheric floater. It's also quite good, with shifting synth tones and haunting pads that lend themselves well to repeat plays. A satisfying finish to an uneven album.

Ambient Tone Poems II is a strange beast of a disc. I was initially thrown by the title, expecting an album populated by tracks like "Incandescent Blue Morpho," drifting, vaporous, mysterious. While there are certainly tracks on the album that fit this description nicely, there are also tracks that are more difficult to pin down, dwelling in many different moods (often on the same track) that are not always complimentary. While the diversity of each track is commendable, especially given that the artist seems to create music almost solely on synth, it appears that IXOHOXI is at his best and most comfortable when he is not playing the sonic chameleon. It is on tracks such as "Small Mammal REM Cycle" and "Amazonia ..." that the ideas are allowed to slowly develop, seep into the listener's mind, and leave a lasting impression. Nevertheless, when Ixohoxi hits the mark, the results are of high quality, and often impressive. Ambient Tone Poems II has the feel of a collection of disparate tracks, with little unified feel. Accordingly, some tracks will strike the listener's fancy more than others. While I hesitate to describe all of the music herein as traditionally ambient, as the title might suggest, there is more than enough interesting music here to please fans of early Alpha Wave Movement and the lighter styles of Michael Stearns. An intriguingly pleasant, if not strong, collection.

go back to the top of this page

ZERO OHMS

Spatial Glacial Nebulous

Space for Music (2004)

Zero Ohms's previous album, True Degrees of Freedom, occupied the number five spot on my top ten ambient/space music releases for 2003. Like clockwork, Richard Roberts, the man behind ZO, releases his 2004 effort, Spatial Glacial Nebulous. This record is something of a technological departure for Roberts, whose previous albums contained a wide variety of instrumentation, mostly electronics and a wide variety of wind instruments. Here the tracks are created solely on the wind synth (basically a synth that is played like, and most often resembles, a flute or recorder--don't think The Hooters, though, this is much cooler) that features heavily on all past Zero Ohms discs. The effect is simple, elegant, and extremely beautiful.

Each track on Spatial Glacial Nebulous is named after a location on the Moon, creating a decidedly heavenly cast to each track--this would make fantastic planetarium music--it's space music in its purest and most original form. (The sonic similarities between the tracks also make each rather hard to describe--I'll make up for my deficiency in sonic descriptives by writing impressions of each track as they come to mind.) "Marsh of Mists" is twelve minutes of blissful synth passages, a lunar lullaby, with sweeps like the best of Jonn Serrie's Planetarium Chronicles. This is the sort of track that one can drift along to all night. "Sea of Vapors" is more muted, the almost-human voices bringing to mind Schulze's "Miditerranean Pads" in its haunting melody, like a lunar choir at perigee. "Sea of Clouds" is even more vaporous than its predecessor--it can be looked upon as the umbric brother of the previous track. "Sea of Moisture" is Roberts at his most Eno-esque, a sonic spitting image of the majestic, flowing atmospheric tracks of Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks. "Sea of Crisis" is, as the title suggests, a darker and more tense track. Deep drones churn stormily, lightened by warm synth passages. The droning undercurrent remains, presenting little threat to the peaceful domains of previous tracks, simply adding a tasty edge of extreme deep ambience. A highlight. "Sea of Cold" is indeed an icy trip, even quieter than "Sea of Crisis"--similarities to Oöphoi and Tau Ceti's Celestial Geometries abound, vibrant, dark, but never threatening. The radiant disc of the Moon is just as beautiful (if not more so) when it is half-shrouded in darkness. Finally, "Lake of Dreams" ends the album with a soothing tonescape of glacially paced wind synth passages. One of the most unabashedly atmospheric tracks Roberts has ever done and undoubtedly one of his best tracks period. A softly ululating masterpiece, equal to the best traditional space music has to offer.

The all-too-accurately titled Spatial Glacial Nebulous's individual tracks tend to blend together, due to the single, though layered, sound source. Those who prefer diversity over an album's length will find the material here to be a too static for their tastes. For my part, I found the effect to be enchanting, a slowly shifting journey through a triumphantly stratospheric mood. While nothing on this album could be called experimental by any stretch of the term, Roberts has created a work that stands comfortably aside the classic "Stratos" by Jonn Serrie (in his non-cheesy mode), and Eno's masterful Apollo. The album is especially wonderful before and during sleep, as the softly drifting atmospheres lend themselves well to both active and inactive listening. While not his most diverse or challenging work, Spatial Glacial Nebulous is no less striking and enjoyable than his previous, impressive efforts. It makes a perfect sonic sojourn, and could function as an equally perfect introduction to Zero Ohms for the neophyte. Highly recommended.

go back to the top of this page