“Coastlines is a very quiet album where the skeletons of harmonies are moving softly through an appealing wall of atmospheres”
1 Coastlines 3:40 2 Clouds over the Horizon 2:15 3 Mists from the Sea 3:50 4 Pebbled Beaches 4:32 5 Tussen De Monsters 7:41 6 Theme from SubAntarctica 5:10 7 Message of Dolphins 9:32 8 Languid River 5:59 9 Thursday's Legacy 10:04 10 Evening on Pohara Beach 5:12 Spotted Peccary – SPM-2602
(CD/DDL/Spotify 57:51) (V.F.) (Deep ambiospherical EM)
Azure winds and hot breezes, sibylline as oneiric mistral winds, lapping of waves on the banks as singings of the sun which shine there, singings of birds and noises of island insects; COASTLINES is a gigantic ode to serenity where the suspended melodies drag such as sonic pearls in turquoise waters. Very lyrical, this last Rudy Adrian's work reaches the depths of our emotions with a delight as intense as the majestic M'Ocean from Michael Stearns. The play of the water is less intense, and the harmonies are more lunar with their mislaid airs but Rudy Adrian reaches his goal, either put in music the panoramas of his youth with a surprising dexterity to create harmonies in movement. Here, the rhythm is totally absent. If we have the impression of rhythm, it’s by the modulations of the winds or the synth lush and the harmonies which fool the sense of hearing. In fact, this 15th album of the New Zealand musician is a narrative put into music. Into a wonderful ambient and peaceful music.
The title-track begins this collection of sound poetry with the noises of a water which we caress with a paddle. A pensive rower makes float his dugout canoe under the attentive eyes of sea birds and of the winds tattooed by voices of astral mermaids. The arpeggios sound like a romance with nature. An unfinished romance like these small verses of a poetry abandoned on the banks. The atmospheres, although less intense, remind a little these aquatic movements of M'Ocean, oceanic waves and lapping of water in more. Very short, Clouds over the Horizon offers these small sonic tales with arpeggios which sparkle among some discreet carillons in a mass of dark winds. Sibylline or oniric, the atmospheres and the harmonies squabble this perception we have to navigating between two anti poles. Mists from the Sea increases this perception, while that Pebbled Beaches is by far the darkest title of this album. The melodies move at the whim of the winds, carried away like as dusts of stars among the big blue labyrinth of the sky of which the cumulus, and their allegorical shapes, are drawing some fascinating corridors Tussen De Monsters is the most intense title here, with beautiful modulations of panoramic washes which are generated by dense layers filled of voices. It's the title which gets closer to the essences of the splendid M'Ocean from Michael Stearns. Theme from SubAntarctica is another very quiet title with a bank of sibylline breezes which caress the soft reflections of a sun of ice. The synth lines blow fluty harmonies which burn like the flames of a candle protected by a bank of dark breezes. Message of Dolphins begins in the plashes of water left by its finale. This title reveals a peaceful ray of sonic pearls of pearls which sparkles and rolls like these specks of dust in the airs. The synth collects this ethereal fable, together with Nick Prosser's flute, with harmonious winds which warm a thick cloud of solar insects of which the chants cover of a peaceful noise a delicate morphic lullaby which makes sing its chords underneath the soft caresses of atmospheres from these ongoing astral winds. Languid River is as this calm dark as we have in Theme from SubAntarctica, but with a decoration of paradisiac island in the background. Thursday's Legacy is another small jewel of serenity with a very accented esoteric approach. The melody crosses the time with forms which adopt the contrasts and the breaths of the synth which manhandle the peaceful ambiences by some effects of dark modulations. The music is dense with a thick cloud of effects, as these jerky breezes which invite a rhythm to form, and with synth lines which pour a scarlet color to Thursday's Legacy which uses rather well its 10 minutes' frame. Evening on Pohara Beach ends this last opus from Rudy Adrian with dark winds which immortalize their echoes throughout the bones of the shells. That makes very Steve Roach!
Rudy Adrian makes ambient music, music of ambiences, where everything floats around us. COASTLINES is a quiet album. A very quiet one where the skeletons of harmonies have difficulty to cross this appealing wall of atmospheres weaved by synths as much comfortable with a sibylline approach than an ethereal one. It's this enticing fight which rules everything here. A beautiful album which is going to seduce the fans of atmospheric music where we have the feeling that the stars are dancing, and the winds are singing on the waters of the oceans.
Sylvain Lupari (November 2nd, 2016) ***½**
Available at Spotted Peccary Music