{"id":19714,"date":"2015-02-17T12:00:31","date_gmt":"2015-02-17T17:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?p=19714"},"modified":"2015-02-16T22:21:59","modified_gmt":"2015-02-17T03:21:59","slug":"review-sound-awakener-september-traveler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/review-sound-awakener-september-traveler\/","title":{"rendered":"Review | Sound Awakener &#8211; September Traveler"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>From our miles-long\u00a0list of\u00a0band submissions comes a haunting ambient act.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>A word up front:\u00a0<em>September Traveler<\/em> by Vietnam&#8217;s\u00a0<strong>Sound Awakener<\/strong>\u00a0isn&#8217;t the type of band submission we typically receive\u00a0here at Toilet Ov Hell Industries (a subsidiary of FlushCorp, a division of Worldwide Bowl). It&#8217;s not even closely related to metal, including any combination of black chill power wave shoe skronk gaze post-n\u00fc-cascadian retro synthcore that you&#8217;ll find in the comments. It&#8217;s also not the type of bleak, my-sanity-is-swallowing-itself\u00a0ambient\/noise this cyborg <a href=\"https:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?s=Gazing+Too+Long+Into+The+Abyss\" target=\"_blank\">typically reviews<\/a>.\u00a0In truth, it&#8217;s the soundtrack to an art exhibition happening in Berlin this month.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>September Traveler is a collection of Sound Awakener\u2019s early works in 2011 and 2012. It is also the soundtrack for Irene Cruz\u2019s exhibition &#8220;What Dreams Are Made Of&#8221; which will take place in Berlin from 6th to 18th February, 2015. The title &#8216;September Traveler&#8217; refers to the journey through moments, total darkness and lost, blurred light. The atmosphere of the music is cold, soft and a little bit dreamy, mostly created by drone elements and field recordings.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Hmm, I love art galleries. I love total darkness. I love drone elements. I&#8217;m officially intrigued. Let&#8217;s give it a shot!<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"400\" height=\"100\" src=\"http:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/v=2\/album=2562204556\/size=venti\/bgcol=FFFFFF\/linkcol=13b3e2\/\" style=\"position:relative;display:block;width:400px;height:100px;\" allowtransparency=\"true\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Keeping in mind that this\u00a0album\u00a0is intended to accompany a gallery exhibition (probably very similar to what&#8217;s pictured\u00a0below), the music is appropriately\u00a0spacious and unimposing,\u00a0allowing featherweight\u00a0melodies and dissonance to drift\u00a0through through the ears of interested\u00a0patrons as they view selected works from the artist.\u00a0Atmosphere, echo and long hallway reverb are the backbone of this album, which starts with <em>September Traveler<\/em>&#8216;s chilly and somewhat optimistic piano runs on top of what sounds like\u00a0a river recorded on hundred year-old\u00a0audio tape. The second track, <em>Learning to Drown<\/em>, takes a somewhat\u00a0shadier\u00a0turn on the\u00a0piano\u00a0keys and adds a slight industrial flavor\u00a0with an engine-like electric drone way, way off in the distance.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-20150\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/art_gallery.jpg?resize=700%2C335&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"art_gallery\" width=\"700\" height=\"335\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/art_gallery.jpg?w=700&amp;ssl=1 700w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/art_gallery.jpg?resize=300%2C144&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The next track,<em> Pale Morning<\/em>, is&#8230; well there&#8217;s not really any other way to put this: it&#8217;s a trip into the babies&#8217; room of an abandoned murder house. Listen to those conflicting music box notes and tell me you don&#8217;t hear a shrouded, otherworldly killer waiting for you to\u00a0wander too close to the charred crib next to the yellowed lace curtains so he can punch through the rotted floor and stab you in the\u00a0leg. The last two tracks, <em>The Shade You&#8217;ve Become<\/em> and <em>The Call is Fading<\/em> return to the darker well of <em>Learning to Drown<\/em>,\u00a0the latter\u00a0of which almost eschews\u00a0melody entirely for a hollow, haunting echo of loosened piano strings droning outward into empty air.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, what starts rather bright and relatively comforting slowly evolves\u00a0into a dusky, near-claustrophobic audio essay. I imagine it&#8217;s even better to hear these tracks\u00a0while viewing the accompanying exhibition\u00a0pieces; if I were in Berlin, I&#8217;d be curious to see\u00a0if this complements or contrasts with\u00a0the art it&#8217;s meant to score.<\/p>\n<p>Taken as a standalone album though, <em>September Traveler<\/em>\u00a0is calm and\u00a0interesting, though not particularly attention-grabbing, since its whole purpose is to take a backseat to someone else&#8217;s visuals. It&#8217;s well-made background music. In this sense it works perfectly, as many of these sounds are just begging to be put to images. Oh hey, just\u00a0like this:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/106133289\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" frameborder=\"0\" title=\"Grundkreuz - What Dreams Are Made Of\" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The downside of this music is that it&#8217;s not well-suited to repeat listens;\u00a0for the most part, you can absorb\u00a0everything it has to offer in its short running time. It&#8217;s also a bit short on variety as the five\u00a0tracks are all cut from a very similar auditory cloth, and there are\u00a0a few\u00a0spots in the opening track where you can hear bumps &amp;\u00a0brushes against the microphone that was presumably used to take field recordings, which I&#8217;m guessing most gallery attendees will never notice, but which are\u00a0a little distracting when listening.<\/p>\n<p>Sound Awakener has a very distinct\u00a0and\u00a0unique style that\u00a0seems perfectly suited to enhancing the\u00a0impact of additional elements, but on its own, may be a bit lacking for the average listener. But if this breed\u00a0of cool, misty ambient music is your thing, head on over to Sound Awakener&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/soundawakener.bandcamp.com\/album\/september-traveler\" target=\"_blank\">bandcamp<\/a> to check out more of her music and soundscapes.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">2.5\/5 Flushes<\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-20485\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/RATING.jpg?resize=700%2C157&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"RATING\" width=\"700\" height=\"157\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/RATING.jpg?w=700&amp;ssl=1 700w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/RATING.jpg?resize=300%2C67&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 700px) 100vw, 700px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/p>\n<p>(img <a href=\"https:\/\/andersbirger.wordpress.com\/tag\/spring\/\" target=\"_blank\">via<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From our miles-long\u00a0list of\u00a0band submissions comes a haunting ambient act.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":19749,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[752,370,70],"tags":[2751,2326,2756,2752,2755,2753,2754],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/SA_ST_cover.jpg?fit=700%2C460&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19714"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}