Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Infinite Inertia – Springtime Nevermore : Ambient / Dark Ambient

Reviewed by Gird_09

The title of the album, as well as the opening track, is Springtime Nevermore, and that is just the mood the recording evokes, from the very first note: eternal winter. In this respect the music reminds me of Biosphere, but the textures are different. I guess you can say that the music is more tactile and less inviting. The time you've spent treking across the frozen wastes with Biosphere will serve well to prepare you for the frozen remnants of human civilization of Infinite Inertia. To me this is simply perfect as this music makes me happy and fuzzy inside, cos it reminds me that the winter is approaching. This summer is finally over, and I hope I never have to experience one more of those.

The music is subtle, restrained and very relaxing. It's also quite complex in terms of instrumentation and arrangements. While there is nothing "in your face" with regards to complexity you can hear that there is a lot of attention to minutae behind the final product. In many ways Infinite Inertia has more in common with musicians like Brian Eno and Biosphere than your generic dark ambient. For this reason I would be reluctant to call the album dark ambient, though it certainly is somewhere in that whole meditative, desolate and introvert landscape. Still the music is very open and free, as opposed to the sometimes smothering or cavernous underground moods of dark ambient. Listening to this album is like having a cold grey sky as your only ceiling.

The track titles are highly evocative, and I must say that Seal of Kadath particularily tickled my fancy. H.P. Lovecraft's the Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath remains one my favorite stories, and certainly one of Lovecraft's best. Thankfully the music fits the title too. It's easily the most unsettling of the tracks, and just the right track for sitting in a corner of the maze under mighty Kadath itself, trying to amass the courage to climb up there to demand audience with the gods. The track is quite simply black as a starless sky, and only Nyarlathotep's beckoning voice pierces the night. I love it.

All in all the music is incredible and the only element of the album I don't really like so much is the cover. Not because the cover is inherently bad, but because it doesn't fit the music very well. A field of warm red color and the chaotic overall design doesn't really connect well with the music. If I browsed the internet for arctic ambience, I certainly wouldn't download this, without knowing the music from before.

I'm definately putting this one on my mp3-player.

Tracks:
(Note that on the tracklisting accompanying the files the tracklisting is different. This tracklisting is given as per the mp3-tags.)
1 Springtime Nevermore
2 Timeless Grief
3 Moon Corridor
4 Seal of Kadath
5 Vampyrium
6 Cultural Downfall
7 Fondling wings of Fire
8 Lycaena Celare

Holland, 2010, Vulture has Landed, file download,

http://vulturehaslanded.blogspot.com/2010/08/infinite-inertia-springtime-nevermore.html

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