EMBRACE STONES

As often happens with Senmuth the track titles are the key to his music. The ethno-ambient opener is inspired to Sigiriya. It's the Sri Lankan temple on the top of a mountain which appeared in a quite famous Duran Duran video (I don't remember the song). Of course the music, less dark than usual, doesn't have anything to do with that 80s stuff.

Following this we have the Sardinian "Nuraghes", characteristic of that Island, nobody knows what they were for. They are very ancient and are high cones of stones opened at the top. The heavy percussion give the idea of a ritual and effectively Nuraghes were likely a sort of primitive temples. The music is too "eastern". Sardinia has its own culture and musical traditions. This track is not bad but it doesn't give the idea of a sunny mediterranean island.

"Sacsayhuamán" means "Satisfied Hawk" even though it topography represents a puma, and is a site in Peru, so on the other side of the world. This time the melody is in charge of the sound of a pan flute which is effective in giving the idea of the Andes. The track is quite dark and very interesting.

The esotheric theories of Valery Barrow appear once mor in a Senmuth's album. Kariog's cave is in Australia but there are hyierogliphs which seem Egyptian inside. Valeria says that it's a sort of portal which can be crossed dreaming (as the Aussie aborigens say) It's a very dark track with a spacey final.

The sound mimic of a bagpipe transports us to the longest fjord of Norway, "Sognefjord", for a two minutes travel. Nice but I don't get the point. At least I don't know what esotheric thruth can be found there.

Now a sad story: in the 90s, the Talibans destroyed two enormous statues of Buddah in a site called Bamiyan. Monumets built between 1800 and 1500 years ago which resisted to the desert for all that time being, destroyed with explosives because of ignorance and stupidity. I don't know if the music sounds sad to me only. It's based on minor chords and the rhythm is not tribal or obsessive as often happens with Senmuth. By the way, there's an international project ongoing to rebuild the two monuments.

"Khajuraho" is a group of monuments in India. This gives Valery the possibility to come back to his roots with a track which alternates dark-ethnic and industrial metal.

The desert of Karakum occupies the 70% of Turkmenistan in central Asia. It has black volcanic sands. There's an interesting place inside it, called "The Karakm Hole" or "The Door To Hell". I just paste here part of an article published by the Daily Mail:

"Soviet geologists were drilling at the site in 1971 and tapped into a cavern filled with natural gas. But the ground beneath the drilling rig collapsed, leaving a hole with a diameter of 70 metres. Fearing that the hole would lead to the release of poisonous gases, the team decided to burn it off. The hole is located in Derweze, in the middle of the Karakum Desert in Turkmenistan It was hoped that the fire would use all the fuel within days, but the gas is still burning today. Look at a photo of the site while listening to this weird track.

I don't know to what the last track is inspired. "Followed Giants" is too generic and if I search on the web I find only baseball. But it's the best album track with its 9 minutes of dark ambient which someties can remind to the nasty brother of Vangelis. The tempo is lazy, like a "Rajaz". It's mainly a single minor chord with slow percussion on which everything happens in the background. Ideal for a Sci-fi or horror movie soundtrack. This is the side of Senmuth that I personally prefer.

Not a special album but a good one.