Album reviews

RVNG Intl.

FRKWYS is Brooklyn label RVNG Intl.’s brilliant collaboration series that pairs inter-generational artists together in splendid unison. An ambitious, exciting project, the series has matched pioneers of various electronic sounds to create fresh sounds that are as distinctive as they are impressive. The 15th instalment brings two innovators of the avant-garde, environmental and ambient music and art scene of ’80s and ’90s Japan with much-lauded US duo, Visible Cloaks. The result is a beautiful and atmospheric record that drifts, almost formlessly, with a natural flow and a calming serenity. Wonderfully warm melodies appear to melt into stretched, warped overtones, elongated pads, emotive keys and soft, cloud-like textures that wrap themselves around you and shroud you in the floaty comfort of this remarkable record. Rhythms are often unfamiliar but are natural sounding, like part of the natural landscape, just as the structures are unusual and unconventional. Yet, despite its abstraction, this whole album has a very personal and human feel. Emotions and memories seep through every layer on the record, revealing more and more of the disparate collaborators’ common drive. The spirit of improvisation, apparent in each artist’s back catalogue, is the backbone of the record, adding an unpredictability that leads us down unexpected paths. Serenitatem is the perfect merging of cultures and eras into one new sound with something fresh to deliver. Here’s to hoping this majestic series has another 15 instalments.