Pollard & Daniel & Booth Vol 4 Play:    Mid-Fi   Hi-Fi (Excerpt from track 'Alpha Primitives') Please go to the Store to buy this item.

CDR / 3 tracks / 74.14 mins

Another album of excellent mid to late seventies inspired sequencer driven music. There are even brief tributes to ‘Ricochet’ and ‘The Call’ from Tangerine Dream. Overall though this is an album which also has loads of character of its own. Deep throbs and fizzing sonic effects provide a wonderfully atmospheric start to ‘Alpha Primitives’. Melodic chimes add a little intriguing detail. I know this sounds like a standard Berlin School intro but that would be underplaying just how good it is. Bass rumblings in the background gradually coalesce into a superb multi dimensional sequence. As to be expected, the mellotron also adds to proceedings but it is not overdone, providing just the right amount of colour. All pulsations subside and we enter a section which contrasts ethereal wordless pads with darker spooky detail. Delicate tron and subtle guitar give a melancholy edge out of which the next sequence, a rapid high register one, emerges. Another sequence joins in the fun. Things morph beautifully, the guitar making a return just before the end. ‘Streams’ literally does bubble and shimmer into life. Little note droplets and soothing flute complete a very tranquil picture. The mood changes as an urgent sequence surges forward along with a triumphant lead line (wonderfully tongue in cheek) that acts almost like a fanfare. Further lines of pulsations fall into formation and we are soon, once more, in Berlin School heaven. ‘Hashra Simpel’ is all rather sleepy until a slow melodic sequence gently brings us back to consciousness. Little guitar licks effervesce around the edges. The balance of each element is just perfect. DL

This page is part of a frame set. If you can't see the information strip to the left of the screen then click on the smd logo above.