Gangleri – musicreviews

I did not really know B.S.E., but I have known them by name a long time. This is their seventh album, so that is not so strange. “Modern Day Diabolists” opens with a trance-ambient track, but that is not how the entire album sounds, “soundscapes” is a good description of the sound of the larger part of this album. Stretched sounds, vocal samples and here and there a more industrial-like rhythm (the very nice title track is even somewhat noisy) makes “Modern Day Diabolists” a varried ambient album. Unfortunately much of the music are somewhat soft ambient and not entirely my thing.
Links: Beyond Sensory Experience, Cyclic Law

“Triangle Of Sorrow” is the first release of Dead.Circuit’s label “Hidden.Circuit”. The release notes and the flyer seem to suggest that the music was composed jointly and that the result is something between “dark drum ‘n’ bass, ambient passages, broken beats and industrial soundscapes”, but the album with well over an hour of music has five tracks of each project, very separate tracks. First up is Septicserpent and inspite of a nice idea here and there, overall his music is not too appealing soft and light dance music. The soft and light touch is blown away by Dead.Circuit’s magnificent first track “Embracing Uncertainty”, an 11-minute “noisescape” in the Propergol style (or rather of course “Repressed Memory Theory“). After this we get Dead.Circuit’s “new direction” in the form of a dark ambient track that goes over into something IDM’ish. “Time To Heal” is a soft techno track like those on the first half of this album, but then we get some more rhythmical industrial sounds with “broken beats” which sound alright. An ambient track closes “Triangle Of Sorrow”.
The more interesting project is Dead.Circuit the ‘old style’ track is brilliant, some parts in other tracks are very nice, other parts/tracks are less so. Of course it never hurts to experiment and since this cd is only € 9,-, it does so neither for the listener.
Links: Dead.Circuit / Hidden.Circuit, Septicserpent

Wow, I didn’t know that this Raison d’Être side-project was still alive! In my Raison d’Être period, I bought everything that Peter Andersson released, including tapes of side projects and the first Atomine Elektrine cd (“Elemental Severance” 1995 CMI). I really loved the album with its great ‘trance ambient’ style. Quite a few years later there was another album (“Archimetrical Universe” 1999 yantra atmospheres) which is not bad, but nothing like the debut. Apparently there was also an album in 2004 (“Binomial Fusion” Essence) and now a new one. The music still can be called “trance ambient”, with which I mean ambient soundscapes with rhythical elements, but not sounding like the debut. The music is soft and soothing, sometimes soundscapish, sometimes ‘trancy’, but always nice and well structured. This may not be music that I will play a lot, but it is a nice album to have if I feel like playing something different.
Links: Atomine Elektrine, Essence Music
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A compilation mcd on Touch showing the ambient side of so called “electronica” music. There is one track from Hazard and I am pretty sure that this is the same Hazard who used to release music under the names Morthond/Morthound on Cold Meat Industry about 10 years ago. Their track starts ambient, but later there is some soft rhythm. The second track is of Fennesz (also see cd reviewed elsewhere) also with an ambient track with a weird rhythm. The best-known act Biosphere could contribute two tracks to this 26 minute compilation and of course this is also ambient with strange rhythms.
I don’t like this ambient electronica too much. It is too monotous for me and nothing really happens. The digipack is beautiful though.

I know this Dutch project from Tuchtunie sampler that is reviewed elsewhere. The title of the album means both “monarch” and “frost”. The latter translation is diametrically opposed to the projects name, because Laufey’s son is Loki, the Northern firegod. “Vorst” comes in a minimalistic 7″-size packing, has 11 tracks and lasts for about 45 minutes. Listening to this album, I constantly have the idea that I already know the tracks from the Tuchtunie sampler even where there are also three tracks on that sampler. There are similar of the same melodies and samples in several tracks. This is a bit of a pitty in my opinion. The music goes from ambient, to rhythmical ambient, more industrial and one noise-track with an awfull high squeak. Some tracks are good, most are not too exiting. The three tracks on the sampler may be enough when there is no more variation. But the ideas seem to be there, the sound is not too typical, so maybe Laufeyiar Sonr will move more in a direction to my liking in the future.

A while ago Roberto Vitali sent me an email with the question if I wanted to review his “first electro-ambient cd”. Of course I seached the internet to see what I could expect and I noticed that this cd is reviewed on sites from several scenes. Both “electro” and “ambient” are musical styles in the “gothic scene”, but also in the “techno scene” and especially in the first case (electro), the music from these scenes does not sound much alike. The reviews that are already on the internet were interesting enough to have a listen to the cd myself, so this is my view on the first Floating Mind cd.
However Italian his name sounds, Vitali seems to be from Switzerland, so is the label that I didn’t know. Urgence Disk Records releases “electronika indus” (KK.Null), “goth-indus” (S.Tantale), “electro pop” (Zodiac Project), “ebm” (Bax XIII), “post rock” (Macadam Pale Horses), “dirty blues” (Hell’s Kitchen), “electro” (Neon Electronics), etc. Goodbye musical narrowmindedness! Floating Minds does fit into this ecclectical musical field. The cd opens with floating, dreamy soundscapes, with here and there rhythmical elements, but as the cd continues, the sound becomes darker and from tracks reminding of Atomine Electrine and Anima Mundi (tracks 4, 5, 7, 8, 10), the sound goes to wonderfull weird tunes reminding of Deutsch Nepal (6) or even Cruelty Campaign (9)! But of course I only mention these names to give you at least a vague idea of the style of Floating Mind. “Deep Visions” is a nice listening experience for people who like tranquil and experimental electronic music.