Employing the full range of synthesizer keyboard magic, with sparkling short repeating sequenced runs of notes and rhythmic elements without any drums or traditional percussion.
Portraying fluid dynamics of futuristic relentlessness
Imagine a substance that is flowing, and keeping no shape, a colorless, transparent, odorless liquid that forms the seas, lakes, rivers, and rain, and is the basis of the fluids within every known terrestrial living organism. All the waters of the world are based on a combination of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom.
Emerald Waters, the newest release from Hollan Holmes, is inspired by the natural world and contains his boundless energy with the hue, saturation, and tone, transforming negativity into positive emotional presence. The sound is all instrumental, mostly synthesizers but there are some key field recordings to add special textures. Holmes is a composer who is influenced by many things, drawing from his own imagination as well as more established traditions, including the Berlin School of electronica, employing the full range of synthesizer keyboard magic, with sparkling short repeating sequenced runs of notes and rhythmic elements without any drums or traditional percussion. There is always a beat. On this album there are no vocals.
The first track is “Hydroelectric” (6:10), expressing layers of motion throbbing with power. A trickle turns into a flow, lights dancing on the ceiling, reflected from the moving water at mid-day, building peacefully and then resting. A sparkle turns into a beam, “Hell or High Water” (6:47) has a colorful name, but the inquisitive beauty from track one persists and there are no gunfights or dramatic bank robberies leading to pursuit by two Texas Rangers.
The third track, “A Ribbon of Life” (6:00), is an homage to all the elements of ecology, joyful whirling, dancing and calling, little bells and circles of melodic weaving signs of life and its gradual rise and fall with each successive undulation. In those chasms from which no one returns, new and varied features of the coast are constantly opening up. The whole surface of the sea becomes one dizzy whirl of rushing, writhing motion, bounding, and crashing, and coiling in an anarchy of enormous power, subdivided into myriads of waves, but the rage quiets and there are rapid small movements, transparent currents blending and bubbling. “Tales from the Abyss” (7:15).
Water always finds the lowest possible destination ::
“The River” (5:57) has an epic sound, an imaginary massive cathedral organ creates the sense of a rippling moving body of water, winding its way towards the distant blue sea, full of life and motion as far as the eye can reach. Imagine that all the streams in the world, small as well as large, the tiniest brooks no less than the enormous rivers, flowing unceasingly into the oceans.
“Taken by the Current” (7:46) depicts a more ominous adventure; vast hidden forces below the surface create danger, the deepest water reaches for the swimmer and holds on, captivating and charming them to sink into blissful oblivion, an electronic natant piano joins this soundscape depicting thermohaline circulation.
The sun glint creates spectacular effects, light on the wind rippled surface of the water, as if the surface of water is somehow dancing. “The Sublime Shimmer” (5:28) brings the sound of glitter patterns that are a moving and changing phenomenon, hear choral light pillars.
Fluids flow easily and conform to the shape of their containers. Brooks, torrents, streams, rivers, all run into the sea, water always finds the lowest possible destination, “Changing Course” (8:00) employs a multitude of imagined orchestral harps and horns. There is movement far below the ocean surface, “Leviathan” (7:49) is moving quickly through the vast darkness, occasionally rising to break through and spout, bubbles and motion are lost in the briny background.
Situated or occurring on or beneath the ocean floor and sinking into deeper openings, find yourself on a dreamy white sandy bottom, covered with chalk-white and silvery-bright shells, with distant open meadows of sea-grass, gigantic mountains thick with woods of bushy seaweed, and packs of fishes darting about on every side: “Fathom” (7:44). Few things are as common as water, the final track, “Emerald Waters” (5:45), closes with a rich tapestry of sound that represents a wide sonic landscape, building and boiling, soaring spirit of Aqua Pura.
Emerald Waters, the album, is uplifting, contemplative and emotionally moving, with its sharper, icier precision and fascination with melody and repetition and textures, and with implied messages about technology’s impact on the planet. This album of wonderful water, elicits visions of layered power, is uplifting, contemplative and emotionally moving. There is considerable science in this celebration of the constant evolution of all the blips and beeps portraying fluid dynamics of futuristic relentlessness. In one word: Fantastiche!
Emerald Waters is available on Spotted Peccary. [Bandcamp | Website]
