Wednesday, December 12, 2012

41. From the Mouth of the Sun – Woven Tide (Experimedia)


News came recently of Dag Rosenqvist's intention to release his last album as Jasper TX early this year, and move on, in his own words, to 'new beginnings'. His project From the Mouth of the Sun with friend and fellow noise experimenter Aaron Martin is the first of these, with another to follow with Matt Collings and hopefully more. Whilst Woven Tide, released by Jeremy Bible's Experimedia label, may show glimmers of both artists recognised sounds - the album endeavours to achieve something altogether different. The result is immediately compelling; full of moments of painful melancholy, disarming emotion and intense bittersweet beauty.

Difficult to ignore is the stark juxtaposition of reverberated sound, and striped back instrumentation, delivered by guitar, violin, interjections of voice/choir, chimes and more. As an entry point to the album and sound, the one minuter The Crossing introduces this aesthetic perfectly, setting out the intent for the rest of the tracks. From here on in we are treated to a set of stories retold with a romanticised tenderness, full of rich imagery, and textures.

Color Loss left me speechless on first listen and continues to affect on subsequent sittings. Working around a relatively simple melody, Martin and Rosenqvist manage an aching mournfulness through repeated choral voices. In the second half, the voices give way to allow violins to continue the motif, establishing an even greater heart breaking melancholia. The same depth of sound is found in the violin notes of modern classical figure-head Richard Skelton, who works every vibration emanating from his strings into gloriously rich sculptural textures. The duo develop this surrounding noise, without ever losing the stark emptiness.

via Futuresequence (read the rest there)
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