MUZIKA STRANSTVIY / MUSIC OF WANDERINGS

'Музыка странствий' - Senmuth (6/10)

Directly translated into 'Seafaring Music,' Senmuth's 'Музыка странствий' is the Russian one man project's tribute to maritime exploration. From the album cover alone, one can get a good idea of what this album is meant to be about; the fresh feel of the open air, the exploration of new lands, and the vastness of the sea. However, while the music here is quite good by Senmuth's standards, there is very little musical connection that the sound here shares with the sea, barring some nautical ambiance at the start and finish.

Once again, the music here is a mesh of some electronic, and more folky, ethnic flourishes. While nothing too new for this experienced artist, the music is a bit better than what's now expected from Senmuth, and doesn't overdo either style into excess. While much of the music here is moreso for relaxation than the sake of an intent listen, the album spawns a certain highlight; 'Звездная карта странствий', which builds up around an interesting and quirky electronic sample.

Along with some beautiful album artwork that showcases 'Музыка странствий's theme, the music here is executed particularly well. While alot of the electronic work that Senmuth has done in the past sounded a little amateurish compared to the stronger production of the ethnic emulations, the electronica style reaches par here, and turns out to be the album's sonic highlight generally throughout.

An interesting album, and offers a few very pleasant sections and one excellent track, but as usual, it feels as if the music of Senmuth fails to reach it's maximum potential, for one reason or another.

This is the kind of album that needs to be enjoyed at more than one level. First of all, zoom on the cover art and contemplate it. The picture contains many contrasting elements: apparently a Kon-Tiki like ship is going to a small coral island over a crystal clear sea, but on the upper right corner black stormy clouds are coming. The ship is in search of a safe place. On the bottom there's a wind wheel, and in direction N-N-W what's above it looks like a map, but the map is transformed into a dry land.

So start listening to this album with this picture in front of you, then look at how Google translates the track titles. It's everything but a perfect translation from Russian, but it can give you an idea.

The first track is translated as "In the flow of sea breezes" and even with the usual ethnic sounds, it grows slowly into electronic in a way similar to the 35007 "Tsunami". It's a trip. It can be spacey or just across an Ocean, but it transmits a clear idea of the unknown, specially in the second rhythmless part.

The following title is translated as "Star Map Travel". I think it means "travel with a star map", like the Polinesian may have done when colonized the Pacific islands. This is effectively a spacey track with the ethnic element consisting in slow tribal percussions but with a main theme played by squared waves as in the Tangerine Dream albums of the late 70s. In the meantime don't stop looking at the cover picture.

"Geography of Otherworldly Land" may be referred to the dry land below the sea on the cover picture. This is a usual Senmuth track, not bad but there's plenty of those things in his albums. The seashore sounds occupy the last half minute and close the track

"Spirits of Coral Islands", as the previous track, sounds already listened to whom knows Senmuth's music enough. The mandolin sound plays a disconnected sequence of minor chords closed by a major one. The final effect is not bad: it can fill your brain with alpha waves, but I can't see any spirit.

"Orientation of Dreams" has a structure that's very similar to the previous track, but there is almost no percussions, and this helps in setting up a dreamy environment. From a purely musical perspective it's nothing special, but don't forget watching the picture. The white cloud on the top is like a human face watching down.

"Storm Meditation" is opened by percussions and rain like Edgar Froese's Epsilon in Malaysian Pale. Unfortunately it's not so meditative.The strings (electronic of course) are dark and too powerful for meditation, but when they sometimes stop leaving only the rain, it has a calming effect. Enjoy the absence more than the presence.

Finally " Tucked away on the horizon" is a 14 minutes long track opened by a sitar. Far from being an epic is in any case a track on which Senmuth seems to have put more composing effort. Looking at the cover you can now realize that the picture is printed on the back of a broken piece of paper. A map or a message in a bottle. Who or what is tucked away? What's behind the horizon? This track is more similar to the usual "Egyptian darkness" than to the spacey landscapes of Planetary Dust. It's a pity that only the last five minutes are spacey in a way that reminds to the Tangerine Dream of the Pink Period.

It's a pity that not the whole album is at the same level of the first two tracks, so that I can't rate it with 4 stars. However it's good enough for 3 and the last five minutes of the album are very imaginative. Let's sail to Alpha Centauri