CLOUDLAND CANYON / LICHENS: EXTERMINATING ANGEL

This mysterious contemporary american musical collective released what I consider to be among the best 2007 albums. Esterminating Angel is a spacey-resonant electronic epic for organic immersive lo-fi drones, various bass minimal textures and intense, emotional ambient melodies. The first seven minutes provide a deep sounding electronic run with a few electric hypno-noises (in the genre of Maeror Tri at their darkest dreamy-like momente), heavily mystical. From 7:00 to the end of the first part, the atmosphere becomes more and more environmental and positively evocative with a serie of minimal strates / superpositions of piano, electric bass lines, covered by transcend synth waves (in the genre of Tangerine Dream at the beginning of the Virgin era or Cluster's Sowiesoso). The second part sounds more mechanical / metallic with a certain post rock aesthetism (Neu! 2), buzzing synth tones, e-guitar freakouts. Not a revolution but an amazing musical travel throw time and space. Recommended for fans of Berlin electronic, abstract industrial music and post rock. I'm curious to hear what the band has to offer after this convincing debut album.

I suppose this Cloudland Canyon/Lichens "Exterminating Angel", 2007 release striked it big in the PA's P/E curators minds as to open a whole Cloudland Canyon/Lichens archive for this EP collaboration. (Lichens, by the way has his own solo discography). I myself would have set it alongside the other already archived collaborator "Cloudland Canyon", but this is just a suggestion.

Anyway to where it matters the music! This project blends the Cloudland's 60's hippie touch/Bay area school's electro/acoustics with Lichens unconventional and darker electronic ones, adding up for an almost perfect blend between both idioms.

A one track EP, which could actually be divided into 4 detectable compositions which account for their own structure and instrumentation, thus making for a quiet surprising ride. This collaboration is balanced yet both musical worlds are detected as single entities or as two, nice!

Haunting, surprising and exciting. As it runs each section seems to outdo the previous one. Kind of raw here and there but the music composition, different sections and its inherent EP's briefness (31:48) saves the day entirely.

****4 PA stars.