“This is a good album which mixes marvelously these old Berlin School ambient and bizarre moods on structures of rhythms borrowed to the New Berlin School's e-rock”
1 On the Soul of the Universe 11:12 2 Celestial Spheres 12:00 3 Amagestum 13:59 4 Nihil Fit Ex Nihilo 18:59 SynGate CD-r MJ03
(CD-r/DDL 56:20) (V.F.) (Ambient and sequencer-based EM)
On the Soul of the Universe begins this new odyssey of Bouvetoya with interstellar breezes empty of life. Their whistles are acute and plunge our eardrums into a kind of black hole from where emerge synth pads flavored in tones of old pastoral organs. Other pads shine all around, multiplying tenfold the sound effects which irradiate in a thick cloud of waves and wrap us in these atmospheres of ether of the Phaedra and Cyborg years. A darker shadow spreads its veil of bass, amplifying this hollow approach which inhales a little that of the Phantom. A line of vampiric melody is all traced out. A movement of sequences makes then roll its keys in sizzling oscillatory loops. These keys go and come in a universe multicolored of electronic fireworks. The vampiric melody is always present. It surmounts this avalanche of synth pads loaded of bucolic flavors. The ambient animal is dying. Its breezes are fading away and its snores cheat death. This is where a heavy movement of black sequences, one would say the big Moog Modular of Mark Shreeve, harpoons our ears and our senses, guiding the 2nd part of On the Soul of the Universe in a glaucous and strongly livened up universe. Pure Redshift moments here! It's a whole start which propels the 4 bulwarks of rhythms and ambiences of TIMESLIP towards ears always eager for long tortuous movements where the rhythms torture the moods, and vice versa, of the analog years. Continuing on the ashes of his very good Interstellarphonic, Michael Jones delivers another solid opus. The musician/synthesist from Ireland makes relive the essences of his inspirations by mixing skillfully, as in his last album, the flavors of Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream in the experiences a little watered down by the time of Pink Floyd. That gives a beautiful album, a very beautiful album for the nostalgic who never have enough, which is more ambiospherical, this time, than rhythmic but which risk to be a surprise, like this 2nd part of On the Soul of the Universe, by a structuring rhythms which really sound like in the time of the analog fragrances. The introduction of Celestial Spheres brings us literally at the heart of the mortuary atmospheres which preceded the birth of the sequenced rhythms of the Berlin School. The pads of ether and these evasive waves which floated as these dreams fed by hard drugs are incredibly enriched and dense. The pads of fogs coming from mystic organs are intense and wrap our cortex for the first 7 minutes of Celestial Spheres before that a herd of sequences, jumping like numbered balls which are floundering in an abacus, weaves a structure of ambient rhythm. The wrigglings of the balls increase a little the velocity, but remain always docile under more and more vampiric caresses of synth pads always perfumed in tones of old organs. Ambient but very intense!
The introduction of Amagestum scrapes our ears with a shower of strident Perséides, here the earphones are to be banned. A warm synth pad, always dressed in these tones of old organ, makes counterweight with a cosmic sweatiness which will awake our memories of the Phaedra years from the Dream. This is a long ambiospherical phase which adopts a bit the one of On the Soul of the Universe with a less violent movement of sequences which hiccups under the chants of morphic and enchanted flutes before offering us of beautiful variances in its oscillations. The very long Nihil Fit Ex Nihilo proposes a delicious introduction where synth pads, pads of voices and flutes are fleeing in the atmosphere with a lot sonic elements which remind me those of Pink Floyd of the Ummagumma and Meddle years. You will have liked to hear Tangerine Dream on Pink Floyd? The opportunity is here. A line of sequences, climbing indefatigably imaginary mountains, structures the first rhythmic portion, always rather morphic, of Nihil Fit Ex Nihilo with brief movements of jolts. Finally the sequences go down these imaginary tops with jerky jumps, a little as a leg which would come down by skipping aside. The imagination helping, it's a little the rundown! A brief ambiospherical phase comes to switch off this approach. The next 12 minutes of Nihil Fit Ex Nihilo will become the most beautiful in TIMESLIP. The rhythm is constant. Like a train it crosses plains and winds valleys under a sonic sky which is misted of silky waves perfumed of psychotronic ambient elements. We nod of the head and our fingers strum the arms of our sofa. The sequences inflate their rhythmic life by bringing nuances in their shadows and in their jumps, modifying perceptibly a pace which oscillates with brief effects of jerks under a sound sky soaked with these cabalistic perfumes which irradiated first works of Klaus Schulze. A truly superb piece of EM which concludes an album completely intended for these ears which like to travel indefatigably in time. Sylvain Lupari (October 15th, 2015) ***½**
Available at SynGate Bandcamp