“Pure is a world of glass' tones, a crystal universe which surrounds us of light floating and motionless movements”
1 Prescence 3:48 2 History 3:53 3 This Life 4:30 4 Glisten 3:46 5 Immersion 6:07 6 Clearing 6:06 7 The Source 3:49 8 The Level 8:40 9 Breathe 3:30 10 Fragments 5: 05 11 Pure 5:53 DiN17
(CD 55:37) (V.F.)
(Ambient Music)
Ian Boddy is one of the most avant-gardism musicians to be. Pioneer of the English EM scene, he released his first opus in the beginning of the 80's with The Climb. Always attracted by the more progressive and darker borders of EM, he created his own label to acquire a bigger artistic independence. Since then, his label produced albums which embrace all the borders of contemporary EM, whether it is experimental ambient, Berlin School style and IDM with an industrial touch. His union with Markus Reuter thus has nothing surprising. Markus Reuter is this German guitarist that we discovered recently with his last solo album Trepanning and also with his surprising collaboration with ['ramp]. He is a pioneer who plays the Warr guitar, a strange instrument where we knock on the strings instead of pinching them. PURE is the 2nd collaboration for this very avant-gardist duet who had released Distant Rituals in 2003. An album that the criticisms considered very ethereal. On PURE, the celestial side is almost absent. We rather float in a world of glass. A crystal universe which surrounds us of light floating and motionless movements.
A foggy sitar releases felted and uncertain chords to open Prescence. It's a track with a delicate movement which sounds like an unreal lullaby, so much the crystalline tones of the chords leads us towards a sleep to the harmonious carillons. And this is what strikes the most while we hear PURE; the subtle delicateness of the tones. The purity of the sounds, of the links and the chords transposes us into a world of subtleties where the sonic pattern flutter about, such as freeze crystals and whose music builds up itself by their frictions and their furtive contacts which are moved by winds matching the dances and the movements. Throughout the opus, Boddy/Reuter mixes the beats and ambiences on chords of pure crystal which emit superb tones of a halieutic transparency, as much as on tracks enlivened like The History and This Life and softer tracks. The intro of Glisten filters a superb serpentine with chords shimmering on a floating synth and a tonality growing with a distressing crescendo. Immersion and Clearing come to change the moods. Floating, Immersion starts on clear chords, like an electronic xylophone, which float in a quilted ambience. A guitar comes to spread its short-segmented solos, followed by a synth which conceals its choirs to set ablaze a long ethereal movement. Clearing is purely experimental. Motionless, its charm lies in the mutation of the sound effects on the crystalline serpentines which succeed in maintain an effect of harmony. And the crystal journey goes on up until Pure and its crystalline sonic pattern. A track with beautiful modulations and limpid keys which wind this strange universe, wondering which of the pure or the impure would be the best companion to be with. Ian Boddy & Markus Reuter are, what we can guess, sound searchers, sonorous diggers. Two musicians who explore forbidden territories, going into an anti-music shape which aims to be all the same harmonious even if quite discordant by moments. If The Level brings us on an a little more progressive side with its acoustic guitar, the other tracks are as well soft as strange with a transparency which hook the sense of hearing.
Sylvain Lupari (April 2nd, 2007) ***½**
Available at DiN Bandcamp