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Beneath The Lake is an ambient project by Dave Canterbury and Nicolas Lampert from the USA. This is their second album, released in the fine trademark 6x6" digipaks of Glass Throat Recordings. This packaging features a beautiful photograph by Nicolas of overgrown remains of civilisation: power lines covered by plants, standing alongside young trees. This theme, the meeting of nature and culture, is also expressed in the music, which combines melodies and man-made electronics with samples of both the natural world and civilisation.
"Empty City", the opening track, is a mixture of samples of highway, city, and (apparently) sheep, overlayed with gentle electric guitar melody and recorder. The chord progression is perhaps a bit simple, but it fits the melancholic, yet desolate theme of the album. I think the project is at it's best in the more ambient pieces, though. "Fire & Rain", as the title suggests, is based on samples of those two phenomena, combined with subtle soft melodies. When you think of it, it is quite obvious, but the sound of the rain and the fire goes together perfectly.
On "Silent Uprising", and especially the extensive "Chasm", a purely ambient sound is displayed, which the band also pulls off very well. Samples of locusts, horses and meadow are integrated with deep drones and effects. While the reference to the themes expressed in the layout and choice of samples remains clear, the music itself also creates a space and feeling of its own, as should be the case with good ambient music. In this case, it's dark, unsettling, yet also natural. Perhaps an accurate, if abstract, interpretation of our world, and the way man interacts with its surroundings. The final track starts off gently, with the antithesis of wind samples and a warm drone. Later on it turns slightly darker again, and then it ends with melancholic guitar chords, much like the first track started.
This is a very pleasant and rewarding album of ambient music that makes good use of samples and melodic embellishments. Besides that, I found the theme, as expressed in approach and artwork, powerful and interesting. The melodies make this album slightly more accessible, and it is suitable for both background and attentive listening. So unless you are an absolute minimalist when it comes to ambient, this is an excellent and recommended album.
O.S.
"Empty City", the opening track, is a mixture of samples of highway, city, and (apparently) sheep, overlayed with gentle electric guitar melody and recorder. The chord progression is perhaps a bit simple, but it fits the melancholic, yet desolate theme of the album. I think the project is at it's best in the more ambient pieces, though. "Fire & Rain", as the title suggests, is based on samples of those two phenomena, combined with subtle soft melodies. When you think of it, it is quite obvious, but the sound of the rain and the fire goes together perfectly.
On "Silent Uprising", and especially the extensive "Chasm", a purely ambient sound is displayed, which the band also pulls off very well. Samples of locusts, horses and meadow are integrated with deep drones and effects. While the reference to the themes expressed in the layout and choice of samples remains clear, the music itself also creates a space and feeling of its own, as should be the case with good ambient music. In this case, it's dark, unsettling, yet also natural. Perhaps an accurate, if abstract, interpretation of our world, and the way man interacts with its surroundings. The final track starts off gently, with the antithesis of wind samples and a warm drone. Later on it turns slightly darker again, and then it ends with melancholic guitar chords, much like the first track started.
This is a very pleasant and rewarding album of ambient music that makes good use of samples and melodic embellishments. Besides that, I found the theme, as expressed in approach and artwork, powerful and interesting. The melodies make this album slightly more accessible, and it is suitable for both background and attentive listening. So unless you are an absolute minimalist when it comes to ambient, this is an excellent and recommended album.
O.S.