TOM ALDRICH / ZOLDER ELLIPSIS

Said so, it's possible that this album is full of tropos, but my ears aren't educated enough to decide wheter it's true. Anyway, "Il Libro dei Tropi" is an Italian sentence and it means exactly "The book of the Tropos".

Whatever the meaning is, this album is great. There are no fillers, no uselessly dissonant passages, and everything sounds perfectly planned.

The first thing that impressed me, is how it has switched my Canterbury sensors on. Throughout the album there are songs, or parts of songs, that remind me to Soft Machine, Gentle Giant and GonG, with the exeption of the long last track which has a simil-reggae tempo of the kind that's usual in Quantum Fantay albums. On the final part of "Night Crossing" the keys sound like Rick Wright on "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn", too.

The album is extremely consistent. You can listen to the whole without gaps and it flows perfectly. Of course, it's not an easy album, but it's not too challenging: the less harmonic parts are well balanced and most of all, you can perceive the structure behind each track. This makes it very enjoyable.

"Passed The Storm", "Brunette" and in particular "Undertow" are excellent. I would love to see this album analyzed by Doug Helvering or any true expert able torecognize the tropos which I suspect are in every track.

I've never heard Tom Aldrich and Zolder Ellipsis before, now I know that I was missing something. For lovers of Avant and Canterbury, but also accessible to any other listener.

The first shot of "Crag Gets Reanimated" ... oh assumed I bumped upon such an atmospheric noise anywhere previously. Yes, this psychic agent-y dark essence reminds me of Krautrock like Scarecrew or so. But sudden complicated psychedelic organ sounds completely catch me. Tricky contrabass reaction is crazy good too. Due to kinda mixture of avantgarde and psychedelic, my brain finally was absorbed into their eccentric soundgarden. The following "Zap Gun" sounds like experimental / post-metal tinged with dry electronic pepper. Quite heavy bullets are shot into my brain again. "Q+A" is another quirkiness full of free jazzy texture like Motor Humming. Funny funky freaky organ dances are enchanting.

Pretty much experimentalism and improvisational attachments can be heard via "Imperial Enlightenment". Not only dissonant but sometimes also melodic, dramatic moments come up to me. Cannot step nor clap to this dissecting stuff but it's so electrocollapsed enough to stir my brain up again. This track and the next "Magnetic Objects" would have been seasoned with Krautrock filled with weird electronika too. "Android Coronation Ball" sounds just like musical hotchpotch based upon heavy rhythmic nation. Eh, how come he to play such a not-easily-performing opus (my love though)?

"The Antidote Game" could be called as an electronic experiment under bombastic heavy circumstance. In the eleven- minute strongbox are lots of elements like ambient, electropsych, avantgarde, freejazz, hardcore ... his experiment should not be finished eternally. Such a stream from this track until the last trip "In The Hole" cannot keep me safe and sound at all. ;)

In conclusion, this portable madness can be recommended for various progressive rock subgenre fans like Exp/Post- Metal, Avant-Prog, Krautrock, Electronic, not art-rock lol. Good.