When you’re ready to indulge in a little alt-folk, hazy psychedelics, acoustic post-rock and/or fuzzy ambient, all in one go, have I got a CD for you. The Past is a Foreign Country, from British duo Venona Pers, is built on crisp guitar and rich electronics for a trip that’s relaxing, engaging and deeply detailed. It eases you in with the homey guitars of “Prelude,” a beautiful song that sounds like it fell off a Windham Hill sampler. Subtle sound manipulations sneak in later to see if you’re really listening. From there Jonathan Hill and Grant Weston spend 10 more tracks playing with a perfect sense of balance. That’s one of the very good things about The Past…; it’s as much a guitar album as it is an electronic album. The weight shifts easily from one side to the other as things move along. With “Burnt Umber” the electronics take over briefly, static-roughened washes carrying the track. “Ferrous” has a grunge-like feel to it, the stripped-down rawness of the acoustic grinding against a foggy sonic backdrop. A vocal clip that repeats under it all works its way in almost like a percussive element. Then it’s into “Blue>Red,” which goes aggressively electronic, distorted textures churning out a droning base that rises and falls almost melodically. “Hideaway Beach” is a classic ambient piece, peaceful flows and perhaps a distorted voice, stretched and smoothed into the current. It blossoms at the end back into that folksy feeling to make itself complete. “Clicks and Strums” is unashamedly post-rock, complete with a strong hook and a beat drop that changes its feel just slightly–another nice touch. That’s the thing about The Past…; it’s filled with nice touches. While the biggest draw for me is the honesty of the thing, the sense of sincerity that rings through each track (brought on, maybe, by the earthy simplicity of the acoustic guitar), it’s also the way in which the disc is loaded with moments that just hit home. A beat here, a sound bite there, a switch of rhythm. There’s a lot going on, and Hill and Weston manage it all smoothly and confidently to make the small things matter. This is quite simply one of the best discs I’ve heard lately. I think you’ll find this one getting set to repeat often. The Past is a Foreign Country is a Hypnagogue Highly Recommended CD.

Available at the Venona Pers web site.

There are times when I quite like the chaotic energy that drives glitch. There are times when I really admire what goes into stitching microswatches of sound together, or even just using software to turn sound into moments of noise and bring them together in a mad flurry that resolves itself into a tasty rhythm. And other times I’m really just quite done with it because it all feels overdone and repetitive. Listening to Enabl.ed’s Saccharine Morning, I go through both of these sensations. A lot of work has obviously gone into the tracks here but it’s massive tangle of sound after massive tangle of sound. The one track that truly catches me is the closer, “Girls Only.” It’s the only piece that feels like it aspires to more than lightspeed soundbursts. It takes its time and feels more developed, using the glithch instead of just overloading your head with it. Ironically, I also like the “hidden track” that’s tacked onto it after a long stretch of silence. They both show character, depth and a touch of restraint. Beyond that, Saccharine Morning moves through without leaving much of an impression; it’s another glitch/glitch-hop disc. If your taste runs to glitch, give this a listen. It may be that I’ve overdosed on microbeats lately.

Available from Global Vortex.

Daren Keck glides through cool post-rock, glitchy rhythmic structures and flows of experimental music in his very listenable debut, 7 Years Under, and he does it without breaking an artistic sweat. The disc opens with “Go in the Black,” where a piano that can’t help but call up thoughts of John Lennon sings against a textbook-perfect glitch backdrop. The followup, “TDG,” is similarly structured, but Keck dials back the glitch a bit–only to ramp it back up again two tracks later on the heavily electronic  “Nap Heist.” The laid-back stretch of “Pensive” and “Lean Sine” gives Keck a chance to pull out his deeper emotional side. “Lean Sine” in particular makes great use of held notes and fading pauses.  These two lead in to perhaps the highlight track here, “Crumble,” where Keck brings it all together; piano melodies, rhythm shifts, high-speed twitchy accents and my favorite touch, a little shot of Latin percussion. It’s a big, sexy, cinematic track. The closer, “October Winds,” builds from charmingly hesitant guitar and courses its way through dark spaces populated by disembodied, muffled voices.  Another favorite. The only time Keck goes a bit far afield for me is on “Barnyard Hedgehog Soup,” where when an accordion sounds breaks into the midst of an otherwise relentlessly repetitive structure–before it lands briefly in an Oldfield-ish pastorale. It’s a weird little piece, but has an odd allure to it. I just can’t listen to it as often as the other tracks here.

Keck is a talented musician and fully in control of his sounds. I found the depth of sound to be surprising, and there were a lot of “Oh, nice” moments for me. This one started strong and just got better with repeat listens. A solid debut, and an indicator of more good things to come.

Available from Wayfarer Records.

Neuropol purports to be something of an aural guided tour through “a fictional city where bleak scenarios of a post-apocalyptic world are painted.” It’s good that there is a well-realized thematic intent at work here; the problem is that it’s often smothered beneath piles of genre-requisite leaden cloaks of bass-heavy drones. There’s movement and texture here, and a lot of sound sources pulled in and manipulated, but I couldn’t shake a constant “let’s get on with it” feeling–long stretches where I waited for something more interesting to happen. This is a disc you need to listen to in headphones. The density of sounds is laudable, and between the overt and the sublimated there’s a lot to hear. To me, Tholen is most interesting in the track “Cryogenic Ceremonies,” which starts with the sounds of a struggle–shivering breaths, groans of pain, a sudden silence–that come off exactly as unnerving as the artist clearly intended them to be. At the very end, a piano, played slowly, breaks through the drone. All in all, Neuropol is a decent dark ambient CD that’s content to not upset the status quo of the genre. Fans of this style should definitely give it a listen.

On a design note, the inside cover of the jacket has quite a bit of writing on it. I’d love to know what it says, but the scheme of a thick, shadowed, grayish-brown font over the dark background makes it entirely unreadable. An unfortunate waste of space and resources. I’m not sure how the folks at the label overlooked it.

Available from Cyclic Law.

Nineteen stalwart analog warriors are rallied into service to form the sonic force behind Gert Emmens’ new release, Metamorphosis. Inspired by the sounds that came from playing around with a borrowed ARP sequencer, Emmens decided to “stick to the oldies” for this disc. The outcome is a deliciously retro pack of tunes that travel through all the familiar spaces. I admit it took a couple of listens for me to latch onto Metamorphosis. At first I found it a bit too angular, almost clunky and nostalgically forced. Emmens’ style eventually grew on me. The sound here is big—as many as 15 of the synths Emmens lists on his liner notes appear on a single track; aside from “Emotive Disparity,” which is just three minutes long and played only on a Yamaha CS-80, the fewest number of keyboards is 12. So there’s typically a lot going on at any given moment from a sound standpoint. The tracks here are fairly long, and Emmens is prone to shifts of style as he goes. The opener, “Strategem of Morality” goes through such strong switches of identity over its 14 minutes that I initially found myself checking  iTunes to see if I’d moved into a new track. The  changes work, once you get used to them. At first I found them a little jarring; after a few listens, paying closer attention to Emmens’ transitions, it seemed more like a cross-fade than a jump cut. The middle of “Collision” bursts into a cool, feel-good break–very 80s in tone, but timelessly funky. Caught me by surprise, and then caught me chair-dancing. “Opaque Divergence” works its way to a strident, almost military cadence, growing bolder and more dramatic as it goes. “Pace of Voyage” jaunts happily along, downshifts with a literal hiss of the brakes, then fires back up on a catchy sequencer pulse. Like many of his Groove Unlimited labelmates, Emmens’ work quickly calls up a score of influences and homages. But it’s not a bad thing; when familiarity is done well and crossed with an ample dose of fresh approach, the connections we make in our heads can just amplify the experience. Does Metamorphosis sound like TD and JMJ in spots? Of course it does. But more to the point, it sounds like Gert Emmens using them as a base from which to launch his own expressive excursions.

Available from Groove Unlimited.

Crickets chrip. A gentle sound rises like wind-blow fog. Shapes emerge. And so John Sobocan begins to craft around you his minimal, mesmerizing and immersive work, Features of Spheres. Sobocan works from a base of drones and atmospheric sounds, a mix that gives the pieces here depth and character. The atmospheric touches can be simple and soothing, like the night-sounds in “Silence” (which swirls like water, eddies of tone working in endless spirals) and the birdsongs chittering around an expectant air in “Leaves on a Forest Floor.” Or they can be a touch more challenging, like the metallic clank and clatter at the end of “Brother” or the doppler-like string runs punctuating “Ma.” They all add a distinct touch to their respective tracks. Sobocan’s drones are also varied in character and feel. The rasp of the foundation sounds in “Brother” contrast with the softer, hypnotic gauze of “Purple Stretch,” the breezy, paper-thin chords blowing through “Leaves…” or the big, held-breath pads with a pipe-organ timbre in “Glow.” Moreover, Sobocan is clearly mindful of the effect small movements create within a drone structure. He uses it cautiously and effectively to create moments of awareness and kinesis. Purists might argue that this isn’t drone, per se. It does have more overt textures and moments of solid sound, but much of Features of Spheres is like a long exhalation, largely unchanging and gorgeous in its lack of movement. But then you’ll come across a track like “Driving My Mailbox,” with fingerpicked notes, heavy atmospheric icing and a thick, well-layered variety of sounds at play. The more and deeper I listened to Features of Spheres, the more I heard and the more it really took hold of me. A perfect looping disc that doesn’t wear out. It’s original enough in approach and diverse enough in execution to keep a listener well engaged. Features of Spheres is a Hypnagogue Highly Recommended CD.

Check it out at Soundcloud.

Prolific ambient composer Dan Pound sets out to capture the grace of jellyfish in his latest release, Medusazoa. He hits the mark, but don’t expect this to be just a long stretch of burbling, fluid pads of balletic invertebrate motion. They’re here, and the first three minutes of the opener, “Liquid Body,” would have you think that’s the case, but then, quietly, Pound begins to fleck the surface with pinprick hits of percussion and we’re off into interesting territory. There’s a mix of textures at play on Medusazoa. Microbeats, backbeats, sequencer rhythms, guitar work and more find way into Pound’s pieces here, and everything glides into place without rippling the waters. There’s a feeling of balance to the flow; “Liquid Body,” with its microbeats, melts slowly into the classic ambient track, “Under Her Spell,” which then opens into the tick-tock’ing sequenced start of “Living Fossil”–but under the rhythm are slow-moving pads. So each new step comes off as a sensible move and nothing is jarring. It all works. The title track contains an interesting blend of sounds. A poky piano melody one-notes its way around synth structures for a few minutes, then takes a short break while Pound gets a little dark. Watery sounds gurgle underneath. A beat rises up and the piano returns, all the elements landing in a strange but intriguing meld that eventually fades into very quiet drones. Pound breaks out his Fender Strat in the 14-minute “Tentacles,” mixing processed chord cries (very Roach-like in their feel) with patient, straightforward playing. The backdrop, shadowy and a trifle tense, offers a counterpoint. “Bioluminescence” comes back to a basic-feeling waveform ambient motif, rising and falling pads set alongside angelic chords. The closer, “Currents,”  has a watery shimmer accented with electronic bubbles, a warm flow that brings the listener back around to the start. Should go without saying that Medusazoa gets played on loop. It’s a great wind-down listen, offering more than just standard ambient constructs while still packing that spacious/spacey feel. Deep listens are amply rewarded, but Medusazoa is also one that should be allowed to fill the space. Another superb outing from Pound.

Available at Dan Pound’s web site.

The beginning to this standard-issue dark ambient disc is so abrupt and graceless that I nearly stopped listening after just a few seconds. I approach dark ambient with a bit of trepidation to begin with; showing a lack of subtlety doesn’t help. I sat through the predictable first track, a ceaseless wad of dense synthesizer wind in a thick dose of layers, and hoped that Parhelion (aka Ihor Dawidiuk) could redeem himself. Well, Midnight Sun eventually becomes a decent dark piece, if nothing mold-breaking. When Dawidiuk opts to let a thin stream of melodic intent through, the disc becomes more interesting. He shows a real sense of restraint and pacing at these times, a willingness to temper the expected grind-and-clash of the genre with real emotion. The title track, “Lament for Whales” and “Meditation Over Open Waters” benefit from it, and they’re the best stretches on the disc. The last two tracks, “Forgotten Outpost” and “Solitude” also pack a less serrated edge (for the most part), and are the better for it. “Outpost,” which also appeared on a Phantom Channel compilation, takes the greatest degree of departure from the rest of the disc, almost to the point of not quite fitting in. Before diving toward the end into noise, it’s quite light in tone. And “Solitude,” perhaps unsurprisingly, winds down to a very calm end. (And the end of the disc as well.) Dawidiuk’s intent, he says in the liner notes, is to present the duality of arctic landscapes, pairing harshness and beauty. In that regard, Midnight Sun hits the mark, and the disc does have passages that take hold of me. So did he redeem himself from that first note? Considering that I’d go back to listen again and deeper, yes. Dark ambient fans, or at least those who don’t need it to be ultra-heavy, should give Midnight Sun a listen.

Available from Cyclic Law.

So you take two well-known names in synthesizer music, Ron Boots of the Groove Unlimited label and Michel van Osenbruggen (Synth.NL) and you send them on vacation together. Naturally they bring some gear, right? And they do a little jamming. (It’s to be expected, after all.) What comes out of it is Refuge en Verre, a robust collection of pieces with a strong retro feel, reminiscent in spots of Tangerine Dream and J-M Jarre–but not overpoweringly so. Rich, rhythmic and possessing a bit of a swaggering rock ‘n roll stride, Refuge en Verre wastes no time in hooking the listener. The first/title track spreads across 12 minutes to showcase the duo’s work in synths, keyboards and guitar. “Orage d’ete” brings in memories of early Mark Isham in its repeated motif. Percussion here carries the track. I like the way a blues-rock feel translates itself through the keyboards in “Coucher du soleil.” This will come off as a strange analogy, I’m sure, but in my head it sounds like a Scorpions tune, done on synths. Trust me when I tell you this is a good thing. And “Rosee du matin” is a slow, lush track with a little hint of Vangelis at the edges. Admittedly, it helps to have a spot in your listening heart for echoes of old-school synth music if you’re going to dive into Refuge en Verre. Because it’s here, and in spots its perceived age can be a little too pronounced; I find myself wanting to move along during “La Roche-en-Ardenne,” for example, because its 80s-ish cadence feels heavily dated. But it’s more hit than miss, certainly. The combination of styles, the chemistry between Boots and van Osenbruggen, and the love of the genre’s backstory, all come through in the music.

By the way, gentlemen: “Combat des coqs” would be an absolutely unstoppable track, crunchy and muscular and rammed forward by gripping sequencers and a great guitar line (or guitar-sounding keyboard) if it wasn’t for the damned rooster sound effects. Never have I more desperately wanted to punch a chicken in the face.

Old-school fans, take a listen. You’ll find familiar grooving grounds in Refuge en Verre.

Available from Groove Unlimited.

Listening to Mountain Spirits, the new release from Conni St. Pierre, is like listening to several different CDs in a sitting, all of them quite good. In one moment it’s an excellent world-music-influenced disc filled with silken flute; in the next it’s a drifting ambient disc, quietly meditative; in the next it’s a New Age instrumental disc rich with emotional tone. Despite its many sides, Mountain Spirits doesn’t suffer from an identity crisis or feel like it doesn’t know where it ought to be. St. Pierre is talented enough and has spent enough time developing her own musical identity that she can pull them all off perfectly. The sad and soulful “Under the Tundra,” with its halting piano and sighing flute, is a favorite track here, a New Age work constructed almost simply–but with balance. The instruments are played with a clean, understated grace and St. Pierre shows that she knows full well the role silence plays in music. That sense of beautiful sparseness is also felt in “Orogenesis.” A stream of calm, droning pads is offset in spots with deep, breathy flute trills. Never truly a melody, though; more of a call, an expression of feeling played with a sense of insistence. “Snowfields” is a lush piece built on electric piano, the melody high and crystalline, again accented with St. Pierre’s soul-stirring flute work. This piece has an improvised feel, the piano wandering off a bit…in a good way. “Rivulet” find St. Pierre in almost purely ambient territory, a low-key wash of sounds, liquid and cool, like a stream carrying away the last of winter’s ice. This is a nicely layered piece, soothingly hypnotic yet complex and interesting.

Conni St. Pierre has been at this for a number of years, and I’m remiss in only coming to her music now. But if Mountain Spirits is to be my introduction to her work, I couldn’t have picked a better entry point. The diversity of the tracks and the quality of her playing on each has kept Mountain Spirits fresh for me through many listens. I’m impressed with how easily and convincingly she switches identities here. No strain, no lack of honesty. Just gorgeous music. A superb offering from a truly talented artist.

Available from Conni St. Pierre’s web site.