Music to Live By

It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve posted about music, but these two latest albums are definitely ones worth noticing.

The first album I got was A Strangely Isolated Place by Ulrich Schnauss. Schnauss has a pretty well known name around chillout and for good reason. His music a wonderful blend of simple and artificial tones with some natural beauty. The result is quite amazing. I struggle to really be able to describe the music. It’s a blend of something like S. Zeilenga and Jon Hopkins. I love both of those artists and hence love Schnauss. This album does contain Monday – Paracetamol of which is the second song on disc 2 of “The Art of Chill.” If you have or have heard that track, it will give you somewhat of a feel for his work (though that is one of the lower-key tracks). The upbeat tracks from an artist like “Bliss” also have a similar feel. I really enjoyed the album and would really recommend you get yourself a copy.

Next was the album I probably announced a couple months ago: Reconstructed Moments by Marco Torrance. You may also know Torrance by the name of Zilent Zpott. There is more of an ambient feel to this cd than Schnauss, but it is not an ambient album. It is a very deliberate and calculated blend of emotions that can be a bit slower than some enjoy. I love well done ambiant as well as chillout. This blend that sits closer to one side or the other depending on song is very well done. I think Torrance’s ability of ambiant are really notable, but his chill is also something to observe. It’s not a generic nor as light as Schnauss’s work, but it is no where near as heavy as something like Namlook’s Silence or Air. It sits somewhere in the middle and well done at that position. To get a feel if you would like the album, I would recommend checking out the Zilence EP on kahvi.org first. I think you will be happy with what you hear.

On music-ish related news: I’m annoyed at the DNS problems I have been having with the music mirror at cardamar.quad341.com. As such, I purchased a new domain, chilloutmixes.com that also points there and will become the primary domain. Please either use the IP or use the new domain and I will probably be changing and possibly removing the old one.

Todo for today

Ok, I need to write a short review for Ulrich Schnauss’s A Strangely Isolated Place as well as Marco Torrance’s Reconstructed Moments (got that Saturday). Also, I set up a new domain for the music mixes that I’ll talk about (though I really should get it properly set up).