Condanna – S/T
Five untitled tracks from project out of Italy grace this CD. This disc opens with a nearly 16 minutes track of low key synth ambient at the foundation and then fleshed out with solitary pulsing tones, clicks, static, sparse electro beats and snips of weird little electronics. The next track comes in just under four minutes and is similar in foundation with a greater emphasis on fluttering foreground electronics, and rapid analog twitches to where they almost come across as alarm type sounds against the airy backdrop. The next one is another epic track at 14 and a half minutes. It is made of what sounds like synthy, violin melody, but volume swelled in a jerky fashion for the initial 3 minutes or so (too long in my opinion) before some additional sounds rise. Something that almost sounds like flies panning back and forth, but I know isn’t, reverberant choral and bass synth tones, and a smattering of fried and squealing electronics. This balance of simplistic synth foundation and laboratory electronics is carried through the remaining two tracks, one of which even ads some distant vocals to the mix. Condanna are spacious and relatively minimal with an almost celestial New Age feel incorporating a dark edge to it, but not a particularly emotional edge. Moments of this I liked, but it can get a little long winded at times, maybe if I wasn’t concentrating on it specifically for review those would seem less obvious as it is a rather passive listen. This isn’t really in a style I feel particularly compelled by, that doesn’t make it bad by any stretch. I just wonder where the audience hides for these kind of releases since I have yet to really have something like this recommended to me. Condanna I think have achieved what they set out to do, but it may fall on deaf ears. – Scott
AVANGUARDIA DELL’ANIMA
Worm Gear 