“A nice album to discover and listen to!”
1 Dancing Light Over the Orinoco 7:34
2 Gliding Past Salto Ángel 9:50
3 Winding Along the Flåm 9:14
4 The Sleepy Haze after Viñales Rain 12:02
5 Sigiriya Sunrise 8:39
6 Drifting Memories 5:51
(DDL 53:12) (V.F.)
(Melodious sequencer-based EM)
Following the paths of Polyphonic Memories, Colin Rayment was inspired by some of the most emotional moments he has experienced while traveling around the world. To this end, the English artist describes on the Bandcamp page of this album, offered only for download, the reflections behind each title. Without reaching the excellence of the first volume, POLYPHONIC MEMORIES II turns out to be a good album with circular rhythm structures and settings that are quite similar, with the exception of the very atmospheric The Sleepy Haze after Viñales Rain, in a beautiful sound picture filled with depth.
It's a buzzing wave rising through warmer breezes that the sequencer's movement takes the shape of a train in the opening of Dancing Light Over the Orinoco. Well hidden in a rich and unctuous tonal setting, this rhythm remains in the background until the 70th second when the sequencer unfolds a slightly spasmodic circular motion. These two lines run in parallel, creating a rhythmic shadow effect that extends over a dense bass layer breathing by impulses in a thick bank of anesthetic haze. Inspired by Tangerine Dream's Jive period, Colin Rayment pours a lot of warmth on this structure of harmonic rhythm where a few chords of a virtual acoustic guitar appear about 20 seconds after the 3rd minute. We are in the field of ambient rhythm which undertakes a better speed while staying ideal for neurons and ears with the flexibility of a bass in a structure where the harmonies are more present in the 2nd part. Articulated on a line of the sequencer and another with a more percussive contribution, Gliding Past Salto Ángel elaborates a rhythmic strategy always circular but more fluid. The synth releases waves that move in spectral chants when the rhythmic structure becomes a little livelier after the 5th minute point. The rhythm then becomes as if struck on a percussive texture where different chords and percussive effects percolate around, sculpting a stroboscopic vision that loses itself like a drift. A drifting over the gigantic Angel Falls where the reflections of the drizzle are transposed into synthesized airs. Winding Along the Flåm proposes a similar structure but with a greater presence of synths and their sibylline tunes. The Sleepy Haze after Viñales Rain offers a slow atmospheric structure filled with layers of synths of varying hues, pulling a bit more towards dark ambient, where a starry road tinkles and sings.
Sigiriya Sunrise follows the paths of The Sleepy Haze after Viñales Rain before taking that of an energetic pulsating rhythm about 20 seconds before the 3rd minute. On the other hand, this nervous and unstable rhythm is wrapped up, not to say smothered, by a dense mass of synth waves whose brassy tones stagnate in an unchanging sound horizon. It takes a good 2 minutes before this rhythm, fattened by percussions and by clicks struck on an anvil, frees itself from this atmospheric mass to wear out its energy in a dense and heavy layer of bass. The synth lets its sibylline chants hover 2 minutes later, giving a second breath to this musical panorama that now slides like images in accelerated. Percussive effects, resonating like hoofbeats on a hard dirt road, complete the decor of a track that will continue to seduce listen after listen. In a beautiful ambient and morphic ballad, Drifting Memories closes this latest Colin Rayment album with an ambient rhythm structure. The rhythm is in trot mode on a circular spheroidal axis where moiré arpeggios sing over humming absent voices.
In rhythmic and ambient patterns which are quite alike, POLYPHONIC MEMORIES II shines a little less than its little brother. No doubt in minds that Colin Rayment still remains a sure bet in the field of EM, making of this new download-album something nice which is quite equal to what he offers to his audience since his blossoming with Abstract Dimensions in 2015. A nice album to discover and listen to!
Sylvain Lupari (March 20th, 2022) ***¾**
Available at Colin Rayment Bandcamp