When you plan to get ready to go sleep, you know that it may be time to put on some new age-like sounds to clear your mind and think about the next day for tomorrow. For New Zealand-based visionary Rudy Adrian, he has accomplished his mission well enough to bring upon his latest discovery Beyond the Sleepy Hills.
Envisioned as a soundtrack for a subtle, yet soothing experience with its nine movements, Adrian draws upon the natural world by bringing it into our sub-conscious. Whether it is meditating alone or imagining yourself walking into a dreamy landscape, Rudy has proven to be the sonic mastermind when it comes to the Sleepy Hills, waiting for us.
There are moments on this album where it’s almost as if you visioned, walking alone in the rainy cities of New Mombasa from the 2009 video game, Halo 3: ODST where you walk alone and having this pin-drop moment, thinking what has happened to the city itself after the Covenant attack during the Battle for Earth situation in the East African Protectorate. Some of its eerie, ominous, and often straight out of this post-apocalyptic nightmare with birds chirping in the district area, knowing that something isn’t quite right when you enter the scenery.
There are the watery effects, droning textures, glass chiming sequences, and almost straight out of the pages between Popol Vuh and Klaus Schulze when it comes to that superb sweep that Adrian tips his hat to the maestros in the Krautrock genre. I almost vision him using a string quartet for one of the Sleepy Hill movements that’ll make Klaus very proud of Rudy to acknowledge him during the Irrlicht years.
It is wonderfully orchestrated that’ll make you want to come back and revisit the sleepy hills for more meditated guidance waiting for you.
