“A good live album that lets hear a Ron Boots always so inspired and inspiring”
1 Raumzeit Part 1 10:37
2 Raumzeit Part 2 10:28
3 Raumzeit Part 3 6:42
4 Raumzeit Part 4 13:41
(DDL 41:38) (V.F.)
(Berlin School E-Rock)
Ron Boots is having a great 2021 year. First of all, When it gets dark! Released at the beginning of the year, this album was the recording of this concert that Ron gave as part of a series of shows performed at the Byss Studio at the end of 2020. Then, A Night at Blackrock Station, one of the beautiful albums of this year made in collaboration with Gert Emmens. Ron is back this time with RAUMZEIT FESTIVAL LIVE SET, an album offered as a download only and this time without any overdubs nor tangenizing. Nothing! Nothing but the soundboard recording of a show given during the last Raumzeit Festival which was held in mid-June. By the way, the videos of this festival are still available on YouTube. Ron was accompanied by his old friend Harold van der Heijden on electronic drums for a performance guided and influenced by A Night at Blackrock Station. Please note that this album will only remain available in its download form.
You can hear the machines buzzing after the burst of an opening chord of Raumzeit Part 1. A line of sequenced arpeggios begins to twirl, creating a back-and-forth movement that is charmed by a first layer of chthonian voices. This layer and the one from the bass add a dimension of emotional drama to this opening, which awaits a pulsating bass line to build on a rhythmic structure taken in tow by Harold van der Heijden's ethereal percussions. His hits are rolling in an atmospheric opening fills of the old flavors of analog EM, from the days of Klaus Schulze's experiments, and that layer of chthonic vocals that flies at good speed over this still-growing electronic structure. The synth coos its harmonic loops while the first orchestrations wrap Raumzeit Part 1 in a veil of sadness. The loops weave their prints between my ears and the rhythm becomes an electronic rock anthem when the bass line harpoons it to give it those elastic curves so reminiscent of A Flock of Swallows from the album A Night at Blackrock Station. It's at this point, when Ron weaves his solos, that the emotional dimension of Raumzeit Part 1 takes over our ears. The music lies in a mega eye of a maelstrom where each turn completed is followed by a momentum that constantly grows the spine of our emotions. This superb track is the subject of a video on YouTube edited by our dear friend Rob Hartemink. Here is the link; Raumzeit Festival part 1 (live). Raumzeit Part 2 follows with an opening bubbling of nervousness in its atmospheric veil. The rhythm is present but static. It serves as a bulwark for the soaring violins and orchestrations that feed the moods of Ron's latest album with Gert Emmens. The boss of Groove nl weaves very good solos on this progressive electronic rock that requires more than one listening to assimilate it well. Except that the solos and the rather symphonic rhythmic finale reach a level of intensity that stimulates its discovery.
A finale from which Raumzeit Part 3 escapes to offer a good and rather lively E-Rock. The drums of H.V.D.H. are in the tone while a rare sonic purification lets heard those arpeggios that shimmered in the opening of the concert. Always as inspired as inspiring, Ron Boots multiplies synth solos which get always a little more beautiful. These solos which lead this short title towards its final fall silent to hear a very good mellotron exhume the last breaths of Raumzeit Part 3. The hum of silence reappears before the first bass-pulses adorn the mysterious opening of Raumzeit Part 4. It's when the piano notes resonate on the structure that starts to run like a ghost train that I recognize The Nighttrain didn't Stop. This flagship of A Night at Blackrock Station is played with more dynamism in the percussions and emotion in the piano. A solid interpretation which crowns a RAUMZEIT FESTIVAL LIVE SET which is more particularly addressed to Ron Boots fans.
Sylvain Lupari (July 6th, 2021) *****
Available at Groove nl