Review by Heathen Harvest/H. Lauer
Permanent link (Heathen Harvest)
Artist: The Infrared Experience
Title: White
Label: ContraMusikProduktion
Genre: Ambient/Post-Rock
Tracklist
01 Cure Me
02 Hands & Light
03 Faith
04 Life Could Be a Lie (A Meditation)
05 The Loss of Faith
06 Hope
07 Change
08 White
I have to confess that I thought something rather negative when I first inspected the (rather svelte) packaging of The Infrared Experience’s new album, White (the band name must refer to the fact that this is very much night-time music, playing in the realm of dreams and archetypes and untrammelled emotion). Basically, I thought “oh no, not another boring solo ambient act with an electric guitar.” There seems to be a lot of that sort of thing going around at the moment…lucky for me, though, in this case the music was fresh, original, and very classy indeed.
Yes, The Infrared Experience is indeed a solo guitar-and-effects outfit with s strong atmospheric bent, but the music is as influenced by post-rock (and even that branch of airy 80’s rock one tends to associate with Danny Lanois) as it is by ambient. On the whole it displays a strong penchant for catchy melody and artful texture layering. The tracks rely heavily on fragmentary loops, delay, melodic hooks, noise squalls, and the odd bit of post-rock strumming to weave eight varied and strongly emotive instrumental pieces.
I like albums that carry me on a journey through a range of moods, and White does just that. The first couple of tracks are dark, eerie, and murky, lathered in fragments of reversed notes and shadowy textures. This gives way to “Faith”, an exercise in upbeat, wistful, and optimistic melody and rhythm guitar.
After that the album returns to its brooding, sultry, gloomy themes, embarking on slow-burning coils of music that hint at times of a swampy malevolence. Having begun in the bowels of some emotional earth and risen to a plateau, the has driven down into the deeps again.
Again, contrast follows, with track six, “Hope”, returning to spacious, uplifting layers of intricate melodies. In fact I would say it even verges on outright joy before turning to the dreamy strains of “Change”, with its dark undertow and almost tidal climax. The album concludes with the title track, a final return to the uplifting feel scattered across its expanse with strummed guitars and extensive melodic and textural layering.
All in all then, a sophisticated and deeply emotive album. I’m very impressed by the way it captures such a range of different moods and atmospheres and presents this variety in such a coherent and flowing way. My initial cynicism is thoroughly reprimanded by this release – a timely warning for all cynics and grumps! I’m very curious to see what this rather enigmatic outfit does next – whatever it is, this album augurs well for The Infrared Experience’s future efforts…
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