On A Brief Sojourn, Quiet World
head Ian Holloway (formerly Psychic Space Invasion)
constructs wonderfully solemn ambient gloriousness out of
synthesizers and Banks Bailey's crisp, bucolic field
recordings. It's a stellar match – this isn't the first time the two
have collaborated – as Holloway's gloriously low-key drones coalesce
perfectly with the incidental recordings: a trickling creek, wind in
the thickets, insect symphonies... All together,
the disc has that uncanny ability to take you to (your own
mental rendition of) the sound sources themselves,
though imbued with an inner tranquility that meshes perfectly with
the pastoral nature of the audio. Through the album's lone,
substantial composition, several stretches
of mood are encountered, including periods of uplifting lightness,
vague menace, and dreary longingness. Certainly, one of Holloway's
core talents is his ability to conjure up these feelings with such
minimal sonic output – it's all about sound placement and the choice
of tones. Design aside, however, what results from all this is a
thirty-six minute passage of sound that is
at once marvellously listenable, exquisite
to rest to, and more than a little
reminiscent of ambient work by Biosphere – especially with
regards to the field recordings, which remind one of a less polar
formulation of Geir Jenssen's atmospheric designs.
A subtle treat.