Part Eno, part Gorecki, all entrancing Ambient with a jazz pedigree.
author: Steve Torino
A record that really sneaks up on you. Naylor-Leyland's muscular and complex ambient offering starts out sleepily then suits up to explore a deeper, more artistic layer of the world beat ocean. It is as well suited for the soundtrack at a seance as it is for a contact improv dance class. It also happens to be perfect for listening with your eyes closed on a quiet day when you've decided to play hooky from reality.
Punctuated by rythmic interludes featuring dumbek and popping bass lines, the majority of these songs cruise along nicely on the ripples of overlapping texture provided by Nicholas' keyboard and guitar work. Track three, the bouyant "Eaves," contains an Oregon-like oboe solo that places this work firmly in the tradition of jazz travelers on the New Age tip, but manages to avoid the hippy sentimentality of many of that genre's practioners.
Brian Eno, the progenitor of all modern ambient music, is clearly payed homage to on the twenty minute finale "Underneath." The rest of this record, however, explores a sacred terrritory that Eno has always been a little too cool to venture into. Under Water Sleeping is a glittering dream at the bottom of a crystalline tide pool. It's a rare pleasure to reach in, pluck it up, and closely examine it's many fauvist facets.
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author: CD Baby
A delicious and rich, sometimes dark and brooding alternative to the stomach-turning twaddle touted as New Age.
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