Fabio Orsi
Audio for lovers
[Audio
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Fabio Orsi (collaborator on last year's 'Wildflower's under the
sofa') returns with a double disc effort that is at once a highly satisfying 2
hour entry in the ambient genre. Although LVD's catalog often leans toward
noiser, less melodic works, Audio for lovers shows both the same modernistic and
minimal sensibilities that we've heard from Fabio in the past, while also
drawing on the earlier, atmospheric work by Eno, which is to say that the album
does precisely what most of us would like out of an ambient work. The
tracks are highly melodic and memorable, the nature of the music is experimental
enough (at least in theory) that I think a lot of fans of the label will enjoy
it, and most importantly, the environments created here will please just about
everyone--this might even be the LVD release to please your non-LVD listening
acquaintances. Purchase the soundtrack to your new life today!
"Audio For Lovers is a profoundly emotive
double album. It sings with a pristine clarity, the musical medium transmitting
feeling and atmosphere with a distilled purity. This is music straight from the
heart, and indeed at times the album transcends all artistic form and becomes
like a direct and untranslated expressive transmission.
The first disc presents a slew of tracks, each a vignette of a particular mode
of love in its polymorphic pathos. Curiously, every track is 1:40, 6:24 or 8:00
long, and the symmetries this produces are marvellous, ranging from short
auditory haikus to more verdant and luxurious sound paintings.
The music is dominated by slowly-unfolding synths, pads, organs, drones and the
like; Orsi deploys deep banks and drifts of sound. Curiously, the effect is not
so much to evoke atmosphere or a sense of horizon as such arrangements often do;
rather the music plugs straight into the brain so that an emotional kinaesthesia
is induced.
Interwoven with the keys are some of the most subtle and delicately played
pianos, guitars and basses I think I have every heard. Orsi relies heavily on
repetition to draw the moment into maximal fullness and his subtle compositions
draw us into different moods and atmospheres with grace.
The theme might be love, but Orsi conveys great depth and, stained with the salt
of suffering, the music never teeters into sentimentality or schmaltz. He weaves
complex affective tapestries, knitting together different feelings with
attentive and gentle brilliance. There is a profound joy running through this
disc, but it is tempered by shadow and the result is unalloyed emotional
apotheosis.
Disc two presents only four tracks, though their combined duration is still
about an hour. This disc is more heavily synth driven and ambient; while disc
one generally maintains slow tempos and minimal structures, disc two really
opens out and is perhaps a little less disciplined in this respect.
The track titles are perfect illustrations of the experiences of the songs; “2
or 3 Moments in 1 Day”, for example, truly instils one’s spirit with the pensive
existential weather of being human and alive.
That said I did prefer disc one; I feel that thematically it is a little more
coherent and compositionally the additional discipline enables it to pack more
into less. Honestly, though, if this album only comprised disc two I would still
really like, even if the deeper magic is on disc one.
I think it takes incredible courage for a composer to expose their emotions in
such an intimate and vulnerable fashion. Orsi has transmitted the moods and
moments of love in its infinite forms just perfectly. I am in love with this
album’s joy, wistfulness, sadness and celebration. This album can transform
anyone into a lover, be it of another, or just of life itself."
--Heathen Harvest