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dw081 - Horchata - Crypsis Cultural Flow - kultur (c) 2011 Crypsis – the ability of an organism to avoid observation or detection by other organisms to protect oneself can be done by various means, such as camouflage or mimicry. Under the same title, the US based artist Michael Palace aka Horchata published a stunning album. Each of the song elements, there are 10 of them in this long one-hour ambient song, are from popular spirituals. Palace took the overall song structure and chord progression and used drones and long evolving sounds. He then created 10 tracks and morphed things into one long track. In essence, this song is a series of songs, hidden or avoiding detection through various audio manipulations. A brilliant sonic trip through deep drones and ambiences with an incredible density is the result. Dig in and enjoy. Disquiet - Marc Weidenbaum (c) 2011 The Spiritual Drone Spirituals are about faith, and so it is a leap of faith that one takes when absorbing the deep dark drone that is Crypsis, a recent single-track release by Horchata. This is because the Crypsis drone, solitary and harmonically dense as it appears to be, reportedly was derived from spirituals. "Each of the song elements, there are 10 of them in this long one-hour ambient song, are from popular spirituals," explains Horchata in a brief liner note at the releasing netlabel, darkwinter.com. "I took the overall song structure and chord progression and used drones and long evolving sounds." To listen for the spirituals in Crypsis seems counterproductive. To listen for something is to fail to listen to something. Take the composer at his word as to the source material, and then just bask in the room-filling buzz. Thomas Park (c) 2011 I hear a vast, shimmering drone-scape-- but what is the source? The sounds are dense and heavily processed. They are also layered to create harmonic effects. But I cannot detect the nature of the source. And this is true for many current electronic or processed works-- that they sound amazing but that a listener would have a difficult time identifying the nature of the sounds. An orchestra? No. Trumpet? No. Flute? Not exactly. By reading the liner notes, I see that this piece was created using actual popular spiritual songs. Having heard this, I focus and concentrate on the whirling soundbed of this piece and from time to time, perhaps, for an instant, I can perceive these sources-- much as a predator on occasion and for an instant may be able to perceive the insect on the release's cover. Highly recommended. Back To Reviews  Dark Winter releases are free to download under a Creative Commons License. |
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