Dan is a long time survivor of the music industry. He spent most of the nineties playing bass in bands & scratching out a living as an events / club promoter, but has since graduated to a nice warm desk job with no heavy lifting.
He decided to start this website as it might be an easier way to still be involved without having to go out in the rain at 2am to put up posters.
It happens sometimes that, listening to an album, you are brought away to another world, to a dimension where space and time are merely words and when you come back to earth you fill regenerate. During that time nothing around you seems to matter. Well, only great albums have this power and Resolven, the new LP of North Atlantic Drift, definitely belongs to that category.
I’m still enjoying and recommending Monuments to anyone that has a passion for ambient soundscapes that North Atlantic Drift is back with a new dreaming album.
North Atlantic Drift is an experimental, ambient & electronic duo composed by Mike Abercrombie and Brad Deschamps from Toronto, Canada. They have been producing music since the summer of 2011 and, if the debut Canvas (2012) caught our attention, Monuments (2013) totally confirmed the artistry of this interesting duo. Resolven, the third stage of the Canadian duo’s musical journey, represents a step ahead and inevitably put North Atlantic Drift among the best ambient/post rock bands.
Resolven is a blend of post rock and ambient music – but it sits more on the ambient side of post rock music - with electronic hints that give it intensity and an original touch. The music of Mike and Brad generally consists of sounds produced using various instruments and the main ones used in this album are synth, guitar and the glockenspiel played throughout the whole album.
In a running time of about 45 minutes, Resolven brings the listener in a dream land where floating in the sound clouds is so easy and so damn beautiful. The album’s eight tracks are made of dense and complex textural ambient pieces and haunting sounds that are all mixed together and slowly rotate in front of the listener like an elegant dancer.
‘More or Less’ is the opening track and it starts with a lovely rain sound and a synth that creates a sort of tension about what is going to happen and it takes a while before dissolving in a gentle melody that allows to glimpse a ray of sunshine. Rain comes back and it’s a fabulous overture.
The album ends exactly as it starts with the field recording of a thunderstorm and between ‘More or Less’ and the closing song ‘Elegy’ the album must be experienced as a unique song. Each track of Resolven is a piece of a bigger composition; each song flows into the following one where it evolves and softly changes the tone. There’s movement, there’s space and there’re the right pauses.
‘Obsidian Flows’ is one of the milestone of Resolven. I particularly like the echoing glockenspiel sound that makes the song more intense. This song is the best soundtrack to our space, virtual and imaginary worlds. The following ‘It Looks Like You're Here For the End of the World’ is the natural prosecution of ‘Obsidian Flows’ and after a soft pause it shines like the the brightest sunrise. The guitar is notable.
I truly enjoyed this album and I've to admit that I'm stuck on ‘Lost in the Sprawl 1’. ‘Lost in the Sprawl 1’ is love at first listening and it becomes an addiction when the glockenspiel joins the melody and the track rises us as the summer sun. Passing through ‘Badlands’, the suspenseful mind trip continues with ‘Lost in the Sprawl 2’ and the warm and comforting synths are pure magic. Together ‘Lost in The Sprawl’ act 1 and 2 are a truly exemplary moment.
‘Elegy’ announces that it’s time to come back to earth and the thunderstorms is there to welcome you back.
Resolven is an excellent listening experience and Marc and Brad are brilliant at getting things just so. If you’re in any way a fan of ambient-post rock music, don’t let this album pass you by.
