Drifting In Silence :: False Awakening (Secret Press)

The notions of psychic change and individuation processes are central and beautifully interpreted in vaporous and subliminal soundscapes which play with incremental progression, movement, motion and pattern.

Warm droning landscapes with the inclusion of sparse melodious fragments

Over the years, and with a handful of convincing albums, Derrick Stembridge (aka Drifting in Silence) has demonstrated to be among the leading actors in the latest development of discreet and soothing electronic ambient music. False Awakening is his first album to be published on the Czechia-based indie label Secret Press (devoted to ambient micro genres and derivative forms of peaceful contemplative music with an experimental edge).

This new effort appears to be a personal musical voyage located at the border of space ambient, new age electronica, and warm droning landscapes with the inclusion of sparse melodious fragments. Conceptually it explores the dreamlike state and primitive human psyche under a jungian psychological rhetoric. The notions of psychic change and individuation processes are central and beautifully interpreted in vaporous and subliminal soundscapes which play with incremental progression, movement, motion and pattern.

Starting with a soul comforting and quite luminous light track to gradually immerse the listener in a more complex and absorbing atmosphere. My favorite is the closing title track with its guitar centric detached leads and reverb soaked gestures. This is not an overly ambitious album, and yet it is concise, solid and radically soothing, occasionally punctuated by darkened swirling tones. Recommended for those who like the early years of sacred space music and any discreet or ascending diaphanous meditative experiences in textured sounds and color tones.

False Awakening is available on Secret Press. [Bandcamp]