Intricate instrumental bliss that weaves, winds, and wiggles through an ever evolving kaleidoscopic soundscape that delivers distinct flavours of a beautifully evocative narrative.
The suite begins with a chirpy little happy guitar refrain skipping on top of some fairly stripped back simple instrumentation. It is the blooming season of the dream state, the spring, beautiful with promise of the raging heat and cold to come.
Even in its most subtle state there is such a rich wealth of interesting licks and riffs that layer themselves masterfully into the wall of sound to keep you diving ever deeper.
At around the 2 minute mark we make our first dark departure. There is a fuzzing euphoric freefall into a more distorted and dizzying sound.
The thumping drums and bass create this updraft that sweeps you off your feet and while you float the guitar pushes down with a powerful pressure to keep you off balance and unsure what to expect.
This section continues to build, bulge, and explode with an ever increasing ferocity that is feral with force and ferocious with its tenacious teeth. Sinking fangs into each riff and refrain and playfully shaking them for every thing they’re worth.
Just when you think there’s no way it could get even louder and more frenetic the frenzy takes it up another decibel.
The next major switch comes around the 6 minute mark at the beckoning of the buzzing bass. It is utterly enchanting. Cosmic magic that casts a sonic spell to impart the feeling of floating through a star speckled backdrop.
This is the moment the listener takes charge of the lucid dream and starts to find control. All the fear and dissonance that came before is still present, but the power had been tamed. Channeled to fuel an interstellar exploration.
Nearing the 9 minute mark the listener has become God. An immortal and all knowing being whose only limits in the dream realm are the scope of their own imagination.
We continue on in this flow state dancing among the stars to the soundtrack of the jazzy and incredibly freeform guitar solos that sing atop the steam power punch of the bodacious bass riff.
The final section comes around 13 minutes and has been foreshadowed by the prickling breaks in tempo and structure. We get one final glorious ride on the ascending divinity of all that has come before, with each instrument lifting it’s song up to the heavens as blessing.
The final minute is a horrible and sudden descent back into the waking world. There is a lingering and lovely sense of epic journey and learning, perfectly embodied in the haunting refrain that plays out as the other instruments subside.
This is creative craft and musical mastery without equal. It delights in its own epic scope and creates and otherworldly impact that reaches out from the subconscious soundscape to serenade the listener with an experience that cannot be forgotten.
This is just the first act of a 7 part suite, and while these 4 parts work in isolation we encourage you to check out the full saga.
Words by Matt Miles.
