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Influences
Sounds Like
"To express one's feelings about any form of ambient material is rather difficult, mostly because in ambient music, unlike many other genres, it is often what is not heard that makes the music impressive. The slow drones and creeping instruments make it rather hard to truly transcribe into words what one is thinking while listening to any production in the genre. Despite this, many listeners still enjoy the genre, each for his own reasons; suffice to say, the personal aspect tied to the process of appreciating this type of music is lost to many.
Enter Rafael Anton Irisarri, the Seattle-based musician who composes a rather unique blend of ambient music. Irisarri’s music focuses on the drones, which have become the norm for the field, as well as a solemn piano, all of which is backed up with what can best be described as strategically placed electronics. However odd that may sound, it’s the truth. Throughout Daydreaming, Irisarri demonstrates his mastery of those strategically placed electronics, which are never too dominant in their presence, nor undermined by other sounds in the mix. The added characteristics this brings to the experience of the CD are akin to the fine brush strokes of a painter finalizing a masterful work of art. It is this subtle detail which is hard to not be enthralled by, once discovered.
Ambient music is designed to evoke thought in the listener, and that’s exactly what Irisarri does in the aptly titled Daydreaming. From the first tone of the opening track “Waking Expectations,” the listener feels as though he is above himself and able to see everything more clearly. Thoughts transcend to a higher plane and Daydreaming is a vessel for a much larger experience. The whole album grabs the listener and pulls him into a barren and frigid landscape. One can’t do the effort justice by trying to describe each track, for the music has to be experienced as a whole to truly be admired.
Rafael Anton Irisarri has forged an album which is a splendid listen, whether you’ve been a fan of ambient music for a while or are just attempting to get into the genre. Ambient music has a tough place in the musical world. Rarely will someone listen to an ambient piece and be grabbed by it right away -- it takes time to construct one's own idea of what is or isn’t being said by the music. Daydreaming is a wonderful album which will take more then a few listens to fully understand and admire. For those already enchanted with this art form, this is a must acquire." - THE SILENT BALLET
"While waiting for some spectral new work to materialise from Norway's Deaf Center, you could do a lot worse than spending some time with the latest long player on founding member Erik Skodvin's Miasmah label. Subtly restrained and following the cleanest of melodic lines, this debut from Irisarri still manages to sound as though it were recorded inside a piano, rather than just in its immediate vicinity.
Fortunately, the Seattle based producer has a firm enough structural hold on what he's doing not to become lost in so vast an acoustic space. The results make for an excellent companion to Greg Haines's Slumber Tides, released on Miasmah last year." - THE WIRE
"Herr Irisarri konzentriert sich voll und ganz auf das Piano, lässt seine Hand ab und zu über die Slideguitar gleiten und katapultiert uns damit in eine rückwärts geloopte Traumlandschaft, die in ein paar Jahren genauso geschätzt werden wird wie die mittlerweile über 20 Jahre alten Alben von den Helden Eno und Budd. Als ob ein großer Diamant ein Karusell zu langsam fahren lässt, drehen und drehen sich die Stücke immer weiter in die Unendlichkeit. Die Größe und die Bedeutung dieses Albums lässt sich kaum in Worte fassen." - DE:BUG
"Irisarri creates music that can be both epic and subdued, with dreamy textures floating effortlessly and dissolving into one another...The listener can only bask in its shimmering beauty." - ANGRY APE
"Irisarri, who cites Mahler, Debussy and Ravel as influences, combines rustling static, haunting piano melodies, a gleeful slide guitar and at times even glitchy synthesizer sounds to evoke a Lynchian otherworldliness."
- FOXY DIGITALIS
"Con i suoi delicati quadretti impressionistici, “Daydreaming” rivela, in definitiva, tutte le
qualità di un artista che riesce a collocarsi con pari dignità accanto ai migliori interpreti di un
ambito musicale invero di recente piuttosto frequentato, dimostrando come, con l’aiuto di
una discreta capacità riassuntiva, si possa dar sfogo alle proprie emozioni senza annoiare o
disturbare ma, anzi, incantando e sperando di trovare condivisione ai propri sogni a occhi
aperti." - LE RECENSIONI DI ONDA ROCK
"Minimal music die langzaam gedroomde klanken laat weggolven. Hij vult dit aan en bewerkt het geheel met organische geluiden en elektronica. Dat varieert van geluiden zijn van de zee, een veraf brandend vuur en vage echo's van wat misschien ooit stemmen zijn geweest tot celloklanken, kabbelende gitaren en minimale drones die zachtjes tegen de muziek aanschurken." - DE SUBJECTIVISTEN CALEIDOSCOOP
"Ses morceaux offrent une place d'honneur à un piano lent et lointain, lâchant des notes espacées, prenant le temps de s'exprimer au milieu de nappes légères et fugaces, veinées de quelques débris et traitements numériques. Parfois quelques accords cristallins de guitare résonnent longuement (A thousand-yard stare et Lumberton, qui nous renvoient à l'époque 4AD de la précédente décennie), apportant ainsi un peu de brillance à ces troubles ambiances Lynchiennes." - ONDE FIXE
"...glide into your subconscious and refuse to relent - casting out pink-hued soundscapes and filigree melodies that allow the piano to shimmer and evolve." - BOOMKAT.COM
"Bello come sognare a occhi aperti, melodie pianistiche liquefatte in dissolvenze digital-ambient, torpori acustici avvolti in nebbia d'elettricità statica, musiche fuori fuoco che prendono vita come un lungo piano sequenza cinematografico." - BLOW UP
"Daydreaming is a haunting collection of stunning dreamscapes which not only allows for the mind to wander, but actively stimulates mental illusions and emotional attachment. Here, Irisarri assembles an incredibly consistent series of particularly elaborate and evocative ambient pieces which are likely to captivate for years to come." - THE MILK FACTORY
"A carefully constructed soundtrack to your most intriguing dreams, the dreams you might remember for a split second before losing everything, only to have images creep up on you some time later...and as the emotive piano shimmers around radio static and lightly picked guitar it is impossible not to get drawn into the shattered American dream." - DOTSHOP
"...you'd be hard pushed not to like this absolute gem. Cherish it, as music like this is something to be savoured." - SMALLFISH
"The streets are full of admirable craftsmen, but so few practical dreamers." - Man Ray
Rafael Anton Irisarri's music is a dual perspective close-up focus on the micro textures of rustling static-filled sonic surfaces with the wide-open distant tree lined horizons of sunset at dusk. Submerged piano melodies, reverberating guitar tonalities and electronic punctuation all contribute as the converging elements, but it's his hand at electro-acoustic composition that offers the listener the often breathtaking vantage into this sonic world. The combined effect is one of time passing in introspection, remembrances of landscapes and the nature of our relationship with things past as we move toward those yet to come. Plaintively yearning, his music never resigns itself to the stoicism of the melancholic, but is asking, moving, and drawing us into a state of hearing, seeing and recognizing the scale, scope and richness of the natural world and ourselves in the everyday.
This music draws as much on modern genre progenitors like Brian Eno, Robin Guthrie and My Bloody Valentine as it does from the more historic traditions in neo-classicism from Erik Satie and Olivier Messiaen. It's this intersection of sounds, both traditional and modernly avant, that make for the balancing act that can be described as something beyond just 'ambient' or 'cinematic' in his music; it brings the listener to a state somewhere between emotionally entranced and psychologically adrift.
No wonder his Miasmah label release is titled "Daydreaming" - as that's exactly where we find ourselves experiencing his music as the listener: caught in the shifting states between self-awareness and disembodied observation with an emotional impact not unlike that most unexpected of epilogues.
Words by Jefferson Petrey, Seattle (2008)
DISCOGRAPHY
Hopes and Past Desires | EP/7"/MP3 (2009, Immune)
Daydreaming | LP/CD/MP3 (2007, Miasmah)
COMPILATIONS Unreleased Tracks 2009 - Abandoned (Too Soon) - LP/CD/MP3 (2009, Fugues)
Musique Pour Statue Menhirs - Still | LP/CD/MP3 (2009, Arbouse)
GUEST APPEARANCES Simon Scott - Spring Stars | LP/12"/CD/MP3 (2009, Miasmah)
REMIXES Balmorhea - Harm & Boon (Rafael Anton Irisarri Remix) | LP/12"/MP3 (2009, Western Vinyl)
I think you succeeded in capturing the universe in your music. I hear the oceans and the deserts and the sky and the moon and the stars and far galaxies.. beautiful and timeless.
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