ALIO DIE

The second of Stefano Musso's three 2023 releases.

1. "Suspended pathways" (19:15) innocuous background music; cinematic enough for a documentary of unoccupied barren landscapes. The soundscape thickens a bit in the 14th minute, but that's about as exciting as it gets. (33/40)

2. "Ascending ladder" (7:32) one of the most engaging, heart-wrenching songs I've heard from Stefano in a long time. (15/15)

3. "Incantatory landscapes" (18:34) dull and boring in a kind of "haven't we heard this one about a 100 times before, Stefano?" while lacking any engaging melody or riff. (32/40)

4. "Contemplative fly" (12:44) a little brighter and more-than-one-dimensional that the two long ones. (22/25)

5. "Enchanted signs" (11:50) a sound palette more similar to the creepy/titillating musics on Stefano's 2015 collaboration with Lorenzo Montaná--my favorite progressive electronic album of all-time, Hologrphaic Codex. Could happily grace a soundtrack for one of my Hallowe'en or Devil's Night shows. A great mesmeric. (23/25)

Total Time 69:55

B-/3.5 stars; despite three great mesmerics, the lows of this one drag it down, otherwise this would be an Alio Die album that I'd highly recommend.

14 years since release. Only one rating given and no reviews, so here goes:

I would go one better than a mid-table 3 for good, but not essential. I award this album 4/5, a live recording of a concert in Prague covering 7 tracks from 7 different Alio Die albums. This artist has been very busy and is still going, with his latest release this year of 2023 being his 67th studio album!

Track 1 is from Tripudium Naturae, studio album number 33, released the year after this concert

Track 2 is from Il Tempo Magico Di Saturnia, album 17

Track 3 is from Sine Tempore, album 29

Track 4 is from Honeysuckle, album 38, released in 2011, 2 years after this concert

Track 5 is from Password for Entheogenic Experience, album 4

Track 6 is from Corteggiando Le Messi, album 20

Track 7 is from Raag Drone Theory, album 26

With those formalities out of the way, I admit that from Alio Die's vast collection, I have not heard many of them. This is my favourite I have listened to, pipping The Hidden Spring for sheer enjoyment. The general feel of the music is long, drawn out, droning melodies that repeat for a while yet change in a subtle manner, so the nuances of the changes keep my attention and do plenty to delight me. The music drew me into a natural world that track by track told a story, possibly of a trip I might make into the wilderness:

Track 1 begins with a whistling I might make as I leave the hostel at twilight. Traffic noise fades away slowly, replaced by wildlife at play all around me. Bird calls delight as I head for the riverside. Track 2 bring a deepening of dusk through red and purple to grey. I walk by the river with branches and logs floating by, bumping into and scraping by the bridge. The river rolls on by en route to the sea. Track 3 moves me away from the river and I am aware of the canopy of stars above, like a huge cathedral ceiling, ethereal and holy. Crazy owls are calling and a 15mph breeze is rippling through leaves around me. Track 4 slows the breeze, gradually right down to stillness; the night becomes hauntingly melodic in its callings, beckoning me to the woods. Track 5 and I enter the woods, where darkness prevails, a twinkling of a star every now and then through the leaves above. Wildlife is rustling around, but is it friendly or predatory? Fear ebbs and flows. I follow the path through the wood, a jittery yet beautiful journey. Track 6 brings a thinning of the trees, larger gaps above, more stars, then constellations. I have made it out to the other side. Open space greets me and a magical lake reflects the rising moon, waxing gibbous. Talls hills to the west cut out the wind. I walk around the lake, listening to the pond life, splashings of ducks and then croakings of frogs. The frogs get noisy. An alarm call?

Track 7 and I run for the hills. Campfires are visible higher up. People are singing. I find a rocky pathway heading up. The melody in the wind has gone. Is that a deer or a wolf I hear calling out? Then there are voices, human; civilization is near. I make it up to an encampment and am warmly greeted. A cuppa soon in hand, I sit with others around a campfire and swap stories. Warmth. Camaraderie. Under stars and moon, it is a simple marvel as hospitality delights. I am given a tent and sleeping bag for the night and I sleep well as the music on the album departs... Then the music resumes and I am waking to glorious sunshine. A new day is dawning, hope eternal shining through canvas. I hatch out into an area of outstanding natural beauty, now visible in all its colours. Wonder fills my heart as buzzards soar overhead. Effortless movement with grace and serenity.

Yes, it is a tall tale and you may well think I have it all completely wrong; you probably get something completely different. Such is the beauty of evocative music and it does not come much more evocative than this! You would not know this is a live performance. There is no audience participation and the quality is top notch.

If you like the more ethereal Vangelis albums like El Greco, you might like this.

Artwork: Nice digipak with the CD, no lyrics of course, but a few photographs of the concert

Length: 74 mins of value for money

Rating: 4/5

While I do not listen to his works often, I have a soft spot for Alio Die's music, mostly as this nice, pretty, and calming output of ambient music. Whilst I know ambient music isn't quite unique, especially since most of it spins around the same wheel that works from Brian Eno, Steve Roach, and Harold Budd spin around, I think Alio Die does have a bit more unique sensibilities going for him, creating music that is a lot more meditative and natural sounding.

I find Incantamento, his 15th studio album in his long discography, to be one that really creates this natural mood quite well. A lot of the sounds and effects on these two long pieces of music use a lot of audio from rushing water, bugs, and other things found in nature, and to my opinion, use these nature recordings quite well within Alio Die's droney sounds.

I find what drives me to this album the most is the big 54 minute track of Lunae, being this beautiful collage in a meditative?ambient trip, with bells and whistles from frogs and bugs, with water rushing in the back to give this a more forestry, and almost pastoral feel. I really like this track, despite its long length.

Though, I will say the track of Waters isn't quite needed, since I find Lunae to work completely fine without it. Even then, I also find Lunae itself to be a bit much, and while I won't scoff at Alio Die for wanting to make lengthy pieces, I also think he should've split the track into two parts, as I feel like listening to a near hour long piece of ambient music, one that isn't as important to my life as Brian Eno's Thursday Afternoon, can be quite lackluster in the wrong moments. Ultimately, I like both Lunae and Waters. I think Lunae is this really pretty collage of ambient and nature, and Waters achieves these two but on a smaller scale, but I cannot help but feel like there is a lot of fat to scrape off.

Another pretty great Alio Die release. He really does know how to make his crafts, though I still think, despite this, he may always have a bit of problems within his line of work. If you like listening to nature recordings and the like, Incantamento is a good endeavor for your green needs.

Some artists have made a lot of albums, some artists made albums with big winding epics and long tracks, and then there is Alio Die, who manages to do both. Progressive Electronic, more exactly ambient music has been a genre I have been following ever since the start of this year with the help of Brian Eno. I find a warm sense of nostalgia and hope for this genre of music, so much so that one of my favorite albums that came out this year was a Prog electronic album. It is a genre that I think isn't exactly for everyone, but it is certainly one that can give an experience like no other. One of the main selling points for the genre, and artists as a whole is how many albums and artists can make with the genre. One of the most prolific artists who come from this genre, Brian Eno, has over 30 albums, and the most popular Prog Electronic band, Tangerine Dream, has nearly 100 albums. It is a genre in which you get a lot out of, but still, have a lot more stuff to look into. Recently I have been following an artist for a bit, that being Alio Die.

Stefano Musso's drone and ambient project, Alio Die, came about in the late 80s and or early 90s. He has made over 60 albums under the Alio Die name, with collaborations included. He has worked with many other prominent figures in the progressive electronic scene, most notably for this work of his, Stefano Musso, who has been with the project ever since the first album, Under An Holy Ritual. This project of his has built a track record of creating long ambient pieces, one of which reaching to be an hour long. I have been following him for quite a bit after hearing one of his recent albums this year, that being Distillation of Time, which I have reviewed before. While I was mixed about the album, I was intrigued by how his other albums differ, and gotta say at a first glance they do not feel the same, but if you pay attention you find noticeable details in his music that show his very high demeanor work effort.

The title track for this album kicks it off in a massive way. The best and most fulfilling experience for this album is with a good set of headphones or stereo speakers. Try to remain in a mostly silent place where nothing is going on for the most part and try to shut your mind off. Do not pay attention to the music per se, let it pay attention to you if that makes sense. The repetitive yet calm drone and soothing synths are the main staples of this track, and the longer you allow yourself to relax your mind, the longer the song lets those two factors wash over you much more easily. From a musical standpoint, this track is very bare bones and lackluster, but if you do not look at it as a musical piece and instead something like a painting, then you'll get a ton out of it. This reminds me of a time I went to a museum with my mom. I cannot remember the music that was being played in the museum, but I do remember the feeling of looking at some very interesting paintings. They weren't my favorite paintings ever, but that experience is what I get with the track. I may not remember the full picture, but I can know what it felt like to allow the scenery and everything around me to shower me. This track works best when you focus on it for a change. Allow the track to listen to you, rather than you listening to it. That is how you can allow this piece of music to be fully understood and appreciated.

This also plays into effect with the second track of the album, Innamorato, however, unlike the feeling I get with looking at a painting or being in a museum, I feel like I am in an aquarium. That same feeling I have with this song applies to my memories of going to an aquarium for the first time, since the song feels cold and blue, yet not in a sad way, but more in a tranquil way. How everything feels abstract and wobbly around it, how everything seems to bleed into each other, it feels very distant, yet very close as well. I am not going to pretend that this is groundbreaking in terms of ambient music sake, since a good amount of artists have made albums that do give this feeling as well, so in that retrospect, it might feel silly to point out something that other artists have done in the past, and the future, but I feel like that shouldn't be something to worry about. At the end of the day, the point of ambient music isn't to be big and verbose, but to give off feelings we might point to based on our life experiences, and based on that this piece, while practically being the shortest in every sense of the word, does indeed excel in that regard.

Lastly, is the three-part suite of Honey Mushroom. This one is an odd one for me since to me it doesn't bring back any nostalgic memories at all. I do feel like this is a more woodland feeling track, with the light acoustics in the back peering their heads out like how trees sprout in the ground, but I can never recall a memory of being out in a forest. My lack of nostalgic childhood memories for a forest sadly makes this probably the weakest track off the album, and it's not that it is a bad track, but the album had a good streak of making me feel nostalgic, and this piece comes along and ends it. It doesn't break the album, but it doesn't make it either. I say this track should've been put on a separate album and instead allow Innamorato to be a long piece of sorts, this way the album's feeling of nostalgia remains the same. Now whether Alio Die's intention for this album was to create a sense of nostalgia is unknown to me, but if I were him I would leave this track on the cutting room floor and expand more parts of the album that I think deserve more attention, and more opportunities to wash over the listener's body.

On that low note aside, this album can make a good experience as a whole. It may not be the best album out there, it certainly isn't, but I think it isn't harmful to at least give it a try, and maybe find something about it that might relate to something from your past, who knows maybe my thoughts and feelings for these songs and how they made me look back on my past might be hugely different than yours. Give it a chance.

I have been listening to a lot of albums this year, mostly Prog rock albums, so let's change it up a bit and review a more electronic album this year. I haven't heard much about Alio Die, I heard he was a pretty good electronic music composer, so I was intrigued when I heard he released a new album this year. I decided to listen to it, and here are my thoughts on it.

The album starts with Il Lievito Dell'anima, or The Yeast of the Soul in English. A 12 minute number that feels very improvisational with an acoustic melody leading the song. It is very atmospheric and calm, and certainly has a layer of relaxing qualities. I really like how the instruments are all random sounding, but to where the randomness actually helps the song out more than it hurts. It is really nice sounding in my opinion, though I do feel like it is too long for how much it repeats its style. I know stuff like Tangerine Dream or Brian Eno often repeats with longer songs, but I wouldn't say to this extent. It definitely wears itself a little thin after 5 or 8 minutes and I just begin to feel like the song should've ended, but it kept going to where I felt a little uninterested with the experience I was having. Overall not a bad song, but definitely not the best.

Next is L'estasi Dei Silenzio, or The Ecstasy of Silence. Similar to the last song, it is an acoustic lead atmospheric track, this time being 8 minutes. Looking at it critically I do think that this song, more so this album, definitely lends itself to the bunch that never changes, or at least changes rarely. While I do admit it is pretty ok when you take into account the type of album this is, I do feel like if you are gonna add more instruments other than synths, you might want to spice things up a little bit. Instead of an acoustic guitar, why not a violin or glockenspiel or theremin. Something to make each song feel unique. This is a good song but it definitely shows the album's issues a bit more prominently.

Next up is Ed Ancor Perdura L'essenza Sonora, aka And Still The Sound Essence Persists. With that title I do believe Alio Die had at least some awareness of the album he made. Again, this is another acoustic led atmospheric song, nothing all too special, but I do find this interesting though. This album is built on acoustic, synths, and no other instruments, giving it a minimalistic feel. With that, maybe we can figure out the themes of this album. Maybe it is the theme of that time repeats itself, maybe that is why the title of the album is called Distillation of Time, because it shows that time is more of a liquid, and like liquid, it is all the same. Maybe these songs show a repeated history with their minimalistic patterns and instrumentation. That may be what Alio Die is trying to teach the listener through these very similar songs, though that's just my theory.

Next is Volo Metafisico, Metaphysical Flight in English. This is an 18 minute track, very similar to the last tracks on here, but with a small twist. There are bells added onto the acoustic and synth mix, and this small addition really brings out a flavor to the track that no others have done before. It gives an almost innocent vibe to the song, like the album rebirthed itself into something similar but something new as well. Maybe it shows more of the themes of repetition, how one's birth or rebirth can be seen as time restarting anew for someone, maybe our lives and the next are different timelines we explore, heck maybe in another timeline I am reviewing a different album that is similar to this one but with a different twist, like how this song is a different twist on the songs prior by adding bells into the mix. That's pretty cool to be honest, but also to be honest this song is a little boring still due to repetitive nature and how long it is, so I can appreciate it on an artistic standpoint but musically it is a bit bare bones.

Lastly is another long song, a 23 minute piece to be exact, titled L'infinito Presente, or The Infinite Present. The title relates heavily back to the themes and ideas of the repetition of history and time. Our present could be one of infinite lines of realities that all are similar but different in their own unique ways. A really cool concept for this album to have, and definitely makes it very unique in how it stands out in terms of many other albums out there, however it still falls a little flat musically. Again, this album loves to repeat itself instrumentally and structurally. Sure all songs sound different enough, but if you blind folded me and asked me to name a song playing from this album, I might guess a totally different song than what would be playing, and that is a problem when you are creating an album, especially an ambient album. It is beautiful artistically but technically it is boring.

This is a boring album, super repetitive, super dragged out, and overall not one I'd listen to again?but artistically it might be one of the most thought provoking pieces of art I have heard. It makes you think about what time truly is and makes you wonder what history will repeat next. This is a beautiful work of art and definitely one I'd say should be appreciated by how it makes you think about time and the world around you.

Relax and meditation: this is what this album is for. Recording sounds from nature in the countryside of Tuscany and applying drone music over them. The first of the two long tracks "Lunae" ("Of the Moon" in Latin) features cicadas which give the idea of a summer evening. An incomplete chord, potentially a major one with its harmonics stands for more than 54 minutes.

Lay down, wear the headphone and close your eyes. The music will do the rest.

The second track, of about 19 minutes, is "Waters", and of course the sound of running water and drops are the main theme. More or less the same chord of the first track, but the subject of both is nature. Real instruments are just a companion for sounds that even alone can raise sensations in your mind.

If you can, go to Tuscany's seaside in a summer evening, rest in one of its pinewoods. Then you'll be exactly where this album is bringing you to.

One of Stefano Musso's many solo works from the 2000s (there were eight that we know of), the end of the decade finds the maestro experimenting with Gregorian chant-like voices as well as his usual heavily-treated zithers and synthesizers to create his Indian-like drone sounds. The music contained here sounds like mediæval calls to prayer in empty cathedrals or abandoned mosques. 1. "Sine Tempore Part I" (16:47) heavily treated, muted male chant voices are swirling around in slow arpeggi before sustained strings sounds join in. In the fifth minute, higher pitched "angel whisps" join in. Everything quiets down a bit in the seventh minute as lower pitched notes slowly swirl around each other from the voice, violin, and "horn"- synth departments. In the eleventh minute, multi-sex choir dominates--especially in the upper "female" registers. Cool construction and execution. Blade Runner-like horn synth joins in for the final couple of minutes. Very engaging and hypnotic. (31/35)

2. "Sine Tempore Part II (8:47) male chant voices projected into the higher registers with a high degree of echo and response--from cello-like sub-layers of instruments--swirling and circling, rising and falling, droning and echoing for the first three minutes before changing the soundscape to one of more sparsely populated, "violin"-led spaciousness. Voices return to the fore in the sixth and seventh minutes--though more garbled and warbled--until slow decay and diminishment over the final minute or so. (17.25/20)

3. "Sine Tempore Part III" (7:10) a slow moving rondo of arpeggi from a male Gregorian chant-like voice and slowed and reversed and accelerated and reversed sustained zither and violin notes and chords. (13.25/15)

4. "Aura Seminalis Part I" (5:43) Mellotron?! with heavily-treated reverberating zither notes and chords and zither incidentals mixed in for good measure. (8.25/10)

5. "Aura Seminalis Part II (23:03) Soaring "string-horn" notes and drone sounds swirl and rise like a church organ from a long-forgotten land and time. The melody line is constant and repeated for the first three minutes before receding over the distant horizon to be replaced by the slow parade of a Silk Road caravan now carrying a similar but different tune and sound--one that is growing closer, moving toward us, celebrating with their nasally reed instruments--until passing by, receding into the behind us while other swirling organs and horns take their turns in the parade, passing us from right to left, one (group) after the other. The processional is very visual, and very cool! In the thirteenth minute, the passed caravan is now a mirage--sounds floating high above us in a way that loses pitch certainty and seems to warble and wobble in a kind of celestial echo. But then, in the sixteenth minute a more modern, fuller, industrial barrage comes our way. A new procession? A different culture? Nasally reed instruments crossing in the opposite direction at the same time would seem to indicate that two different cultures are crossing paths (apparently, peacefully; perhaps even oblivious to one another). Cool experience! (39.5/45)

Overall a very peaceful, relaxing listening experience--one that could provide for quite a nice REM sleep.

B/four stars; an excellent addition to any prog lover's music collection--especially if you love meditative electronica.

Entheogenesis is the state of mystical hallucinations inducted by psychothrope drugs. In South America the indigenous were used to grow a plant known as Devil's Bells for its properties. Seeking for information about the album title, I doscvered that in the garden inside my condominium there one big Devil's Bells tree. It has very nice flowers and contains scopolamine. One of the effects of scopolamine is that makes you sleepless.

Exactly the opposite effect caused by this album. I'm used to long electronic drones, and this isn't as boring as some Phrozenlight can be, but one hour of a major chord where the first change happes after 28 minutes is not exactly what you need if you want to stay awaken.

It's relaxing, newagey. It reminds to Mark Isham's Tibet, but without any trumpet. One can even enjoy it if in the right mindset, but it's nothing else than a major chord with its harmonics and some other notes coming and going.

I don't knw whether the artist was actually experiencing the entheogenesis, but honestly this album failed to bring me any particular sensation. Wrong password, probably.

Stefano Musso aka Alio Die, has a lot of good releases, so please do't think that he makes boring stuff only. Just this is not the case. An extra chord adding harmonies every 10 minutes is not enough and the sequence of 6 notes that's constantly repeated below the major chord is nothing special.

There are better things in Alio Die's huge discography.

The second collaboration between Alio Die and Lorenzo Montana - The Threshold of Beauty (2019), will be easier to describe, music wise, as an Alio Die reloaded version of his personal language taken a bit too far.

Lorenzo Montana's music composition stands close to this incidental, quiet untaggable, but made short by different taggings, kind of music, which one of whose frontal founders is Alio Die.

The good news.

I know little about Lorenzo Montana, but Alio Die was on a phenomenal streak, album excellence wise, and he never (and I know as any other of his followers) releases mediocre works, so there is always this permanent warranty of music composition quality, which, to rush things up, is no guarantee, of course, of music composition geniality, which he also has delivered constantly and abundantly.

The "Why is it a ***/* release?".

Its best qualities may well turn adverse. It is too incidental (to call it somehow) in some of its tracks, (by the way there are 6), to actually be enticing in their totality and by Domino effect, they make the whole album too disperse to hook you up and few hooks are thrown (first and last tack) to catch ones full attention.

The result.

As far as constructing living and original soundscapes it is flawless. As far as it being a trip to plan recurrently?

Well, there is where I silently start counting stars.

It has taken me quiet some time to put words to this live recorded experience more so to rate it.

Alio Die - Kalisz Concert (2018) captures perfectly Alio Die´s mastery as a performing composer. His ability to build up front, enticing, transparent structures from scratch could not be best portrayed than in a live performance . The repertoire consists of seven uninterrupted compositions taken from 6 albums which go from 1993 to 2017 and he plays alongside Tomek Pilecki & Mateusz Ciszczon both on rattles and bells.

Alio Die´s music language, to set it somewhere for newcomers in these electronic music borderlines, could be called Post-Bay Area School of electronic music because of its electro/acoustic blend and back to nature spirit.

A gentle tour de force of mutating & mysterious environments embracing trance inducing melodic lines with clear identities, solid musical structures, moods and tempos.

The repertoire is as follows (Track-Song-Album). The stars, of course, are mine:

1- Axis Mundi II - Tripudium Naturae (2010) ****

2- Brace Di Trasformazione - Il Tempo Magico Di Saturnia Pavonia (2003) *****

3- Vulnerable Choice - Seamlessly Bliss (2006) *****

4- Amadriadi - Tripudium Naturae (2010) ****

5- Expansion And Contraction - Sit Tibi Terra Levis/Introspective (1993) ****

6- The Door Of Possibilities - (Alio Die & Ora) The Door Of Possibilities (1994)*****

7- Time Zone Portal - Time Zone Portal (2017) ***** (even 6 if allowed)

My Rating ****4.5 PA stars.