Various Artists: 8x Various Artists: 8x (Dark Duck - 2001) Another in the Dark Duck series wherein Various Artists' contributions are all stirred into a communal hodge-podge of experimental sounds. This time around, it's Stephen Philips, Tom Purdue, Will Green, Felex Tendler, Ben Summers and an anonymous contributor. With especially immersive atmospheres, 8x will feed the desires of X addicts everywhere. A gut-droppingly-low drone surges through the introductory Notch infused with fibrillating electric currents and murky textures. Lighter shimmers and gloopy pulsing murk make for a hallucinogenic submersion in Ornament, where occasional tonal strands pitch-bend dramatically. Vaguely ringing essences thrum through Trite as a tappy percussive riff tags along. The blurry tonal shifts of Blind (2:44) soon get stippled by aggressive rhythmic stutters which erupt into Allocution (9:52); a rumbling void is filled with thunderous pulsations and streaming starsheen; a beautiful, sometimes spooky, floatation zone of abstract wonder. The abrupt switch to the more in-your-face tones of Solecism is jarring; the track sounds like a slightly cacophonous factory of odd little sounds and notes. Distantly jangling guitar notes and scritchy textures combine as Concavity fills the final minutes with nearly-musical essences. Count on Dark Duck's X projects to go where most people never imagine... the Various Artists who supplied the soundstreams of 8x rank an 8.5 for forging pleasantly odd pathways for your mind and ears to wander. This review posted December 5, 2001 AmbiEntrance © 2001-1997 by David J Opdyke (except CD cover art, rights retained by original owners).