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 | Various Artists:Exhibitions (BLT - 1998) Universality is the goal of BLT label head, Katsuya Hironaka, and he achieves it with this global gathering of various ambient/electronic artists. Overall, Exhibitions is an interesting, generally well-done collection of different styles and sounds, definitely worth checking out. |
| Smooth synth loopings are soon underpinned by rapidly pattering cymbals in O-din's opener, Water. The echoey keyboarding and frenetic rhythms pass through several various phases, keeping the piece interesting as it evolves. Terry M. Huud goes back in time to 1969, via NASA and TV space samples. This nostalgic track uses several different styles, from fairly straight piano, to droning waves of synth.
The hypnotic Frere Moth by do-it-yourselfer Saul Stokes (Stokes builds his own synthesizers) features layers of synth and discreet percussive effects, adding up to over 9 minutes of slowly percolating electronics, accented by occasional warbles, wails and buzzes. Strike up the drum and bass... then overlay it with Katsuya Hironaka's lounge piano stylings; Phrase Sea mixes the differing sounds very well, adding a bit of electronic ebb and flow in the distance. Unusually quiet siren and horn samples open Exploding Fields by Octopus, aka Charles Uzzell-Edwards. Weird bleeps and muted beats meld together as spacey harp sounds trill across the tapping cymbal rhythms. All these elements and more swirl in a dense pyschedelic, which unexpectedly dissapates. Viridian Sun delivers more of their resonant space-drone in the form of Indistant. Highly processed guitar and synth create a nebulous vortex of soundwaves, from coarsely grating rumbles to softly whirring tones, beautiful and strange. Aft Noon is Ryuta Kawabata and Katsuya Hironaka. Their track is Noon, Alaska Time; a muffled, yet groovy little bass beat propels most of the track, eventually fading out to synth swells and piano notes, then returning. Terry M. Huud reappears with the quietly pounding drumbeats and swelling strings that open Obliquity of the Ecliptic. Cheering crowds, dense overtones and assorted sound effects mull about to a somehow anticipatory effect, but finally simply fade away. Hironaka joins in again with Passing, a track from his Golden Days CD. A slice and dice arrangement of voice samples (newscasters?) are carried along by electronic arpeggios, sweeps and piano tones. Sweet Paraffin is the second contribution from Saul Stokes; this time it's playful layerings of various synth sounds, many overtly "electronic". Mid-tempo percussion and bell tones flavor the mix. |
| A friend called Exhibitions "nice"... and it is! There's nothing wrong with that. |  |
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