As I was listening to WAsteland ElectronicAH Vol. Too ~ Ambient​(​esque) Musics for Your Lucid Coma, I found myself constantly wondering if the tinny and slightly clumsy construction of some of the pieces were on purpose or the sign of someone perhaps less adept at the craft than a listener might hope. So I headed over to Micah Cone’s Bandcamp page where I read that these songs were “Created on a 2009 MacBook Pro utilizing Garageband and its Musical Typing feature.” Mystery solved, and now I better understand why I’m not overly interested. There’s nothing all that objectionable here, but I find that the pieces hold my attention for a couple minutes at most before I want to move on. There are very listenable moments—Cone hits it squarely on “A.% (Gravitational Intolerance)” with a blend of wobbly, lonely bass notes and a quietly singing synth line placed over the sound of a Rhodes electric piano. I like the way he metes it out slowly, with the synth taking a more vibrant line. He sends the Rhodes bouncing between left and right in a way that’s mildly dizzying but acceptably so. “A.# (150,000-Light-Year-Long-Lightning-Bolt)” grabs my attention at first. It’s very subtle, with a catchy melody over humming electronics. It loses me a bit when the tone switches up and Cone brings a sort of silly-sounding synth to chirp out a passage. “A.^ (The Low-Hanging Fruit of Knowledge)” is addictively fun—again, at first—but unless you’re a huge fan of chipset and video game theme songs from the 80s, the fascination will probably wear off well before it runs its almost-10-minute course. For those first few minutes, though, its jaunty tone and meaty bits of bass are engaging.

I understand that the whole old computer and musical typing thing is meant to be the hip draw here, but irony only goes so far. If the music doesn’t hold my attention once we’re past the curiosity stage, what’s left? I hear a lot of elements I like on this release, but the approach and Cone’s tendency to spend more time on a piece than it needs just makes me shrug. Give it a listen for yourself.

Available at Bandcamp.

I admire artists who choose to challenge themselves, who don’t allow themselves to sit in the same spot doing the same thing. It can be a risk, but there’s also a strong chance of a fresh new reward—for the listener as well as the artist. Phillip Wilkerson’s Swiftly the Sun represents an artist taking that kind of chance. Looking to explore new modes of electronic expression, he says, “I simply cast my creative True Self adrift to produce whatever came of its own making.” We, along with Wilkerson, now get to enjoy the rewards of his risk. Swiftly the Sun doesn’t seem to go too far afield of the artist’s general motif. He has always been one for soft pads and slow melodies packed with emotion, and that plays out here. But there are moments of experimentation, some subtle and some not, that will take long-time Wilkerson fans (such as myself) into interesting new concepts. Jumping straight to the front of that line is the standout track “Calm.” The title is a lie, by the way—this song has kinetic energy to spare, doled out in chunky doses of spiraling, dervish-like synth lines. Whether this is Wilkerson playing his trills straight and then manipulating them or it is him fiddling with the knobs to spin and twist these lines, it’s absolutely captivating. It works its way up into a feel almost like a jazz combo where the rhythm section lays down a steady, unchanging melodic base while the synth lead just goes gorgeously off into an inspired jam. I could plug this one into my head all day and be happy. It hits me spot-freaking-on. Maybe it’s because I love an old-school sound, but it’s also probably because it just works. “Vanishing” plays with chime tones that ring out over a quiet base. It’s a familiar juxtaposition, and here, between the lush drones and the repetitive nature of the chimes, it has a light hypnotic effect. There are plenty of quiet spots here as well, and Wilkerson nails them, as usual. The opener, “And Lilacs Too,” offers a piano melody that walks past misty pads. It is patient and emotionally descriptive. “Ways of Forgetting” is 25 minutes of pure ambient immersion. Long pads mingle like clouds and nothing is raised much above a confident whisper. Like meditating? Here’s your soundtrack. It’s full-on calming, slows the breath, and sets time aside. It’s not one of the out-of-character track here, but it’s a track that reinforces why I enjoy this guy’s music so much. The release closes with “Beyond the Farthest Horizon,” another slow-motion drift with a faint touch of melancholy. It has a certain spacemusic mentality to it, but feels more grounded, more like a captured quiet moment stretched out for us to examine in our good time.

Swiftly the Sun may seem more like a set of experiments to Wilkerson than it does to me. From this listener’s perspective, it’s yet another collection of music to listen to over and over. It has all the heart I expect from him, and adds in some fun and slightly unexpected shots of energy and vigor. An excellent addition to an already impressive catalog.

Available from Bandcamp.

What if I told you that there was a dark, industrial-edged album that actually manages to be sort of…soothing? You could take my word for it, or you could just delve into Between the Horizon and the Abyss, the long-awaited new release from Yen Pox. There you’d find an hour’s worth of big, dense masses of sound and sensation that, okay, might not soothe so much as hypnotize, but at the same time, they’re not out to crush and depress you. Michael JV Hensley and Steven Hall craft an accessibly grim, decimated world to take us through, a place that is at once desolate yet populated with ghosts and decaying machinery. Sandstorms of sound rise up and rush in to create the album’s harshest moments. “Grief Ritual” is one such spot, perhaps more effective for the way it comes out of the almost brighter, more ambient tones of “In Silent Fields.” Rolling in on growling bass pads and an effective pairing of industrial chugging and the squeal of tortured metal, “Grief Ritual” hits a point just to the able-to-breathe aside of isolationist ambient. We hear lost voices calling at us from the distance. And when it relinquishes its hold, you feel it. However, where it deposits you is in “Ashen Shroud,” which features vocals from Dark Muse that ring of singing a best-forgotten ritual. There’s excellent texture work here, and echoes that give the feeling of being in some underground place, a place we shouldn’t necessarily be but we can’t help looking around. I close my eyes during this track, and just let the sound do the painting for me. That’s perhaps the best description I can give of what happens when listening to this album: you reach a point of surrender and, dark ambient or not, you just let it finish showing you around. There are elements of grace and beauty lurking here, patiently awaiting your acceptance. They know you’ll get around to it. There’s a lot of tasty stuff happening here. “White of the Eye” opens with a rip of viciously distorted guitar and sounds like it’s about to break into an industrial rock melody before it just scatters itself across the wind. “The Procession” screeches at you and there’s another of those voices always just out of reach behind the caustic rasp of sound—what if it’s telling you how to get back? What if it’s lying to you? Yen Pox crank the density on this track, surround you in the sound and obscure your connection to the world. When they ease the pressure, you’re left with bass pulses puddling around you and everything is fading…for good.

Waxing a bit rhapsodic about dark ambient might seem odd, but it’s to Hensley and Hall’s credit that their work implants these kinds of visions, these feelings and stories, straight into the listener’s head. It’s easy for dark ambient to straight-arm a listener or to have to goad and dare them into listening. But really good dark ambient entices you to listen by appealing to some questionable urge hiding in your soul, then holds you there with a combination of hypnotic influence and well-crafted sonic narrative. The Yen Pox Bandcamp page says it’s been 15 years since the duo’s last full-length release. While it was clearly tell well-spent as far as crafting an excellent album goes, I would like it to not be another decade and a half before they get around to having their way with my mind again. Dark ambient fans will devour this; even casual listeners looking for an intriguing change of sound should strap themselves in and take this ride.

Available from Bandcamp.

One of my review listens for Roy Mattson’s Mesmer happened as I was driving along wood-shrouded, unlighted and twisting New England backroads on a dark autumn evening. There came a point where I reached a recognizable confluence of action and atmosphere, where the music was exactly suited to the moment. Now I find that I want to listen to Mesmer only as night comes on, when my mind goes comparatively quiet and I can just let the spaces Mattson creates unfold all around me. On his page the artist notes that he intended the album “to be listened to at night around a campfire or stargazing…” and it’s safe to say he’s squarely nailed the theme. Of course, it helps to layer in field recordings of night sounds; the crickets, the owls, all that, set over quiet pads. Lace it with the active pulse of smooth sequencer lines for a bit of vibrancy. And a touch of tribal percussion in just the right spots always offers up that after-dark feel. The mix of styles blends well one track to the next, and the overall feel is laid-back and pensive. The opener, “Mesmerized,” has a little of everything; owl hoots welcome us, pads lay the groundwork, and the sequencer lines gets us moving a bit. Mattson sets the sequencer aside for several more tracks, then brings it back as a gentle wake-up call on “Invitations and Consolations.” In headphones, the sequencers play out very nicely, spatially. I find the percussion elements here just a little distracting. It sounds like Mattson is leaning toward some kind of syncopation, but it’s hitting a bit randomly. “Feathered Night” leads us into tribal territory by adding a familiar-sounding percussion line in the midst of a breeze-soft flow. It carries into “Quietude” where we are also serenaded by crickets. Flutes slip in as accents, their breathiness upping the organic ante.This time-stretcher of a track takes me out of myself and out under the stars. During one listen, I checked the track length and was surprised it was just eight and a half minutes. Flute plays a major role on “Tending the Embers.” Coasting over pads, it’s meditative and prayer-like. I have always felt that flute music in an intensely personal, intimate thing, and that feel is conveyed well here. And as someone who has say watching the glowing coals of a fading fire well into the night, I connect with this track.

At 81 reasonably quiet minutes, Mesmer has the ability to take its listener quite deep. It’s a looping listen, for sure. That being said, as I tend to prefer a bit more subtlety in the use of field recordings, there are spots where—for me—they might be a trifle overdone. From a thematic point of view, they’re spot on; from a me-as-listener perspective, less so. (For example, the first few minutes of “Invitations and Consolations.”) Also, as much as I enjoy the tribal tones that Mattson brings in, I feel like it might sometimes wander a bit far into Steve Roach’s yard. On the other hand, I’ve been down Mesmer’s starry-night path many times and have fully enjoyed it. Mattson’s output it starting to ramp up; he’s got a lot to say, musically, and this is as good a place as any to start listening to him.

Available from Relaxed Machinery.

Two and a half hours of deep, flowing, textured classic ambient music from Altus? This is what is known as “a very good thing.” Having listened to The Time Collection several times over, I feel confident in saying that this release deserves a place alongside similar benchmark recordings such as Roach’s Quiet Music series. Musician Mike Carss has always exhibited a gentle hand on the ambient controls and a definite way with slowly coaxing emotional content out of long-drawn pads, but here I have to say he has exceeded himself. But this is not just a long set of pad-on-pad drifts. There is texture and shadow, light and dynamics. Things are a bit ominous at the outset; “Illusionary Progression” begins with rattling sounds and a looming, rising bass pad. The tone is a little gritty, very much in a spacemusic vein, complete with the sound swooping around your head. The up-front drama here belies the quieter thoughts ahead, but it definitely grabs your attention. Carss settles into a classic feel, layering his way quickly into a rich, fully dimensional zone. At its midpoint, it spins toward the light in a change of approach that borders on breathtaking. Those crunchy bass sounds slip into a supporting role, rising up beautifully in places, and the voyage is well underway. Carss gives his tracks plenty of room to patiently stretch out–the shortest is 11 minutes. He’ll draw a melody out to a splendid slowness, as on “Absolve the Past,” filling it with an elegiac feel, a hesitant beauty that slips quietly into your soul. It’s heard again and happens again on “What You Leave Behind.” Echoing notes brightly pick out the extended melody over cloudy pads. To me, Carss nails the sense of hesitant but hopeful departure. From the first time I heard it, this track had something to say to me. In the middle of “Memory Thief,” he calls in a vocal sample pad, adding an unexpected element that simply folds itself into the existing calm flow. It’s to Carss’ credit that you barely notice its arrival but you feel its effect. This long journey concludes with the 30-minute arc of “Walk With Oblivion.” Here we turn back toward a darker sense at first, then again rise slowly upward in tone. This is a big track, with plenty of dramatic rises and falls, yet still manages to remain calm. It is spiritual and meaningful.

I would consider The Time Collection to be living atmosphere ambient. That is, it’s the release I want to put on loop and just let it run, filling the space at low volume, more or less living up to Eno’s definition of ambient as being “as ignorable as it is interesting”—although here I would strongly argue the “ignorable” part. But as music that is simply there, existing alongside me, yes, absolutely. Carss’ output was already quite impressive; I consider him one of the best names in ambient (and I know I’m not alone in that). The Time Collection sets a fantastic high mark, showcasing an artist absolutely in command of his element. However you choose to experience it, whether in an Eno-esque fashion or up close and meditative, it will captivate, calm, and move you. This is a truly amazing piece of ambient music, and a must-own. Far and away one of the best things I’ve enjoyed this year.

Available from Altus’ web site.