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CD Feature/ hum: "Inner Navigation"

  Tobias

One of the duties of the artist has always been to express what is hard to express. Since, even though we know that the truth can only be found within ourselves, we are inexplicably afraid to go there. “Inner Navigation” must therefore be regarded as guided meditation. For it boldly leads us to our centre, to a place where even angels can’t tread.

On the other hand, you will need to do some active listening to enjoy this album and its well-kept secrets won’t reveal themselves exclusively by their own  accord. If you like metaphors to express the basic mood and intention of a piece of music, then this record would be a mirror. It merely reflects those parts exposed to it – the more you are willing to bare, the more you are likely to learn. “Inner Navigation” starts off almost like a whisper or a faint breath, like a cloud on a grey 100htz horizon. It then sets out to explore the higher and the lower ends of the sonic spectrum, from the ethereal sphere of lucid dreams to the deep rumblings of the inner heart’s core, only to culminate in the masterful thirteen minutes of “At the Waters Edge/Aurora”: Something pulls and twitches under the surface, bubbles of water rise to the surface, a stream builds and grows in intensity and cleaves into a horridly howling torrent. After the storm has passed, the frightened spectator leaves his place of shelter and his eyes wander over the most intense beauty ever seen, a landscape of bright shades covered in mysterious mist. By then, the album has reached a point of no return and an irrestible momentum and follows its course to the apocalypse of the aptly titled “Chance to Diappear”. Certainly, this music resides at the banks of both sinister Drones and Dark Ambient, but its intention is not to scare the listener, but confront him with something unspeakable. One can not help but feel that to the artist, this has been a journey as well, one from which he awoke in amazement. For Chistov Dmitry, who previously released under a plethora of monikers, the album certainly marks a moment of rest and signals a new plateau, from whence to explore new directions.

If the aim of the mystery sea label was to release works inviting one to let go and take a dive, then this must be one of their most exemplary efforts. Just don’t expect any miracles – you’ll have to take the final leap yourself.

By Tobias Fischer

Homepage: Mystery Sea Records