Strangely fresh.
The ideas it contains are mostly formal choices, but the overall
reason and atmosphere that it evokes is like a dark spring morning.
These are not songs
but avoid ambient. They are sparse, but not minimal. The disc sets
a serious atmosphere, but not academic. The tracks are neither happy,
nor sad, and each composition is simple but free from cliché.
There is rhythm but no percussion, harmony but no melody.
The sounds are
soft and flowing, like watercolor, and reflect an interest in the
repetition of natural forms: it echoes without repeating. Its spirit
goes further than "music" while not approaching feel-good,
angst, or other worn out music excuses. It is young enough to be
optimistic, and old enough to understand that tomorrow is another
day.
There are several
discs lately that approach this existential yet optimistic vantage
point. Perhaps evidence of social change: rising economies fall,
then stabilize. A chilling butterfly wings to tsunami story: Bush
made an on-air mistake and said "devaluation" instead
of "deflation" and the Japanese Yen fell several full
points in stock markets before White House aids corrected the costly
error. This fragile world ecosystem makes all of us older faster,
and yet still creates a bubble around us of false security of good
triumphing over evil. Each of us has to make up our own minds based
on the false testimonies of both right side and left.
In the end, a balanced,
lovely, and modest opinion of the world.