Hark The Silence [Vinyl]

The Silence are a storm that has been brewing across Japan for over a year—and now that system is breaking into the skies of the rest of the world! Their self-titled debut of this past spring was simply a preamble to the fluid and formidable electro-acoustic interplay that has quickly evolved since then. The first record is of a song-based nature, rendered with careful beauty familiar to long-time listeners of Masaki Batoh and Ghost; a sound that turned on occasion into greater journeys. Hark The Silence takes that notion and runs with it in a powerfully jamming album containing all the musical elements that define The Silence in flowing and transcendent performance, all of it recorded on 24-track analogue tape, a process which brings their musical and spatial qualities into dynamic balance.
Everything in the universe accessible to The Silence may be found in the “Ancient Wind” trilogy that fills side one of Hark The Silence. From the depths of space rolls washes of gong, through which a terse, minimal bassline comes marching. Rattles of prepared piano spark and pass through the frame, blown over with the celestial omnipotence of a flute. The now-sensuous groove is underscored with luxuriant stereophonic drums rolling across the speakers. Representing the state of nature from which all music as well as The Silence has to come, “Ancient Wind” Part 1 ceases to exist, and explodes into a furious Bo-Diddley beat for Part 2, a chant replete with acid-rock guitar solos, an encompassing saxophone testament and an echo-unit driven drum breakdown. Part 3 of “Ancient Wind” resumes the chant in the mode of “Gangamanag” (from Ghost’s Hypnotic Underworld opus) and extends the fury of the progression in 7/8 to include a dazzling organ solo over unending volcanic eruption. As the swirling mass subsides, a few rusty blue notes from an acoustic guitar are sounded over the encroaching Silence. Showing in one side that The Silence are capable of EVERYTHING.
But there are three more