When Brian Eno invented the ideas of Ambient music (by its very nature, no one could honestly lay claim to inventing Ambient music itself), the key factors were that it could be ignored by the listener, or completely blend into its environment, without losing any of its value. Indeed, for Eno, it was value added if the music did achieve these feats. Of course, there are very obvious pitfalls for a genre thus defined, and all manner of new-age, or thoughtless, or just straight bland dross has been passed as Ambience in the proceeding decades. Sublamp, thankfully, avoids these problems and has offered here, on his new album Shiverland, a peaceful, yet texturally complex wash of sound.
Ostensibly a drone based work, Shiverland gives many signposts to its inspiration in the track titles. Pieces such as ‘Lichen Song’, ‘Airsnowtree’, ‘Mountainhead’ and ‘Glimmerspeed’ are indicative, though not merely descriptive. There is a wintryness to the mild distortions fed through cavernous reverbs, though fine details – tape hiss, warm static bursts or machine whirls – sit in the immediate soundspace, not the far-off distance, giving contrasting contextual depth to the spacial elements. Nothing is allowed to drift aimlessly. There is a continual development of ideas and sonorities within each piece and the relatively short track lengths for this type of music assist Sublamp in keeping things sharp and focused. So, while the overall drone-like aesthetic may initially have you thinking this could just be background noise, it is difficult to disengage and treat the music as merely a wash, the details continually drag you back to attention. Indeed, in the end it’s debatable whether this is actually Ambient, by Eno’s definition.
Yes, we’ve heard processed drones from Tim Hecker and Fennesz and the likes, but Sublamp has things of his own to add to the aesthetic, which he presents here in an engaging and enjoyable album.
Adrian Elmer
