Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting
Aidan Baker is a musician & writer currently based in Toronto, Canada. Classically trained in flute, he is self-taught on guitar, drums, & various other instruments. He performs the experimental collective ARC & the ambient/doom metal project Nadja.

On this album he creates four wonderfully slow moving night scapes. Through 'Melusine' a rounded warm tone loops with hissing puffs, shimmers and echoes and a deeper bowed note within. There is a suggestion of melody, resonance, yet subdued and an almost flat sound. The loops are gradually added to and there are crisper touches before the long fade, but it is a deeply hypnotic glacial development which the other tracks will share. A soft calling tone, guitar chime loop and bass pulse run through 'Rusalka', subtly manipulated and slowly diminishing. A soft slow voicish melody that also gradually changes plays over the top, with a few chitters and flutters passing through. There is a sense of slow building as the layers change balance, and in the last few minutes the surface develops details. Parts drop out to a final looped call. A contrast is formed in 'Lorelei' between a strumming loop and layers of pulsing buzzes and gentle tones. Strange little calls run through, some sounding like manipulated voice samples, echoed and infrequent. Gradually a tone music builds, recalling a calliope and enticing more activity - scrapes, jitters and machine rhythms, resonances and sudden brief loudnesses, drifting. Finally, a different tack with 'Undine' where a rapid guitar pick loop and soft percussives build to a cloud of sound for guitar notes to ply across - a fast base and very active. Long tones develop and gain prominence as the base fades a little, before guitar loops play the fade.


http://www.megaupload.com/?d=Q1CXPVNE

No comments: