Tuu: The Frozen lands Tuu: The Frozen Lands (Amplexus - 1999) In his first solo release, Martin Franklin steers Tuu's sound away from the humid tribal excursions of, say, Terma. Instead, this 21-minute mini-disc delivers a panoramic slice of otherworldy vistas straight from The Frozen Lands. Gone are the ethnic instruments and earthy rhythms; this is a place of rolling clouds of sound, an unkown area bathed in washes of lightness and darkness. The limited edition 3" CD, sheathed in an attractive heavy paper, is released on the Italian Amplexus label, and available from Soleilmoon. When we interviewed Martin in December '98, he told us how he'd written music to accompany a ceramic sculpture exhibition his friend, Nikki Coe. Sadly, Nikki died before the show; her husband finished her work in progress according to her notebooks, allowing the show to go on. Martin played live at the exhibition's opening (and a recording of that performance served as ambience for the show's duration). Martin told us, "Several of the hastily composed pieces have been somewhat of an obsession for me over the last few years. The Frozen Lands piece is the last of those works which I had planned to develop." A powerful and eerily unfolding intro leads to Frozen Lands (8:32), though once inside, things calm down a bit allowing one to contemplate its lightly sparkling beauty. Bell tones flow as liquid while faint string-like breezes waft and choral gusts soar skyward. Billowing gongwaves signal the end of this piece. I read an air of trepidation in Silent Writing... whispy tendrils of sound seem to tentatively peek into strange territories. Deep electronic swells comingle with higher, thinner tones giving shape to the lay of this strange land. In darkly radiating ripples, muted gong bursts spread across the surface of Gangiri (4:54). Faraway, occasional flute-like wails merge with the subsonic pulses which seem to rise as if in reverse gravity. Vaporous veils of sound exist, only to finally fade into nothingness. Definitely a departure from the dense tribal atmospheres of previous Tuu recordings, The Frozen Lands is equally entrancing, just an alternate means of arriving at a different location. I would certainly liked to have heard more, but grant a 9.1 for these beautifully shapeless artifacts from another sonic region. For more Tuu info, consult the Tuu Webspace. This review posted April 28, 1999 AmbiEntrance © 1999-97 by David J Opdyke (except CD cover art, rights retained by original owners).