Melaine Dalibert & David Sylvian — Vermilion Hours
Vermilion Hours is a collaboration between French pianist Melaine Daliber and British soundscaper David Sylvian. The CD or vinyl album takes in two long slices of piano minimalism/ low-key simmering ambience, with two shorter versions of the same tracks topping off the release.
I’m reviewing the CD version of the album- this comes presented in a four-panel mini gatefold- it features largely hazed blue, grey, white, red & green colour palette. Within the middle of the front cover is a small/ delicate hanging flower of green, red and yellow.
The release opens with “Musique pour le lever du jour”. This 20.28-piece is built around a descending then ascending piano pattern, which is both gentle and brightly harmonic. Around this, Sylvian adds subtle edges of light reverb glimmer and subtle ambient tone simmer. Dalibert’s playing is crystal clear in its clarity, with each series of notes played with steady yet pristine flow.
Next, we have “Arabesque”- which rolls in at the 20.22 mark. This piece feels more considered, with a greyer to more subtly brooding feel coming to the surface. Dalibert slowly paces out a blend of lows and mid-range key hits, as Sylvian creates a more swirling/ gentle hovering haze to back it. For this track, the melody line is less pronounced- yet over time it reveals its structuring- and it’s a lot more uncertain/ eerier than the first track.
The release is finished with shorter, around three to four-minute versions of the first two tracks. These are ok, I guess, but I found them somewhat redundant after just playing longer/ to my ears better versions of the same tracks.
If you enjoy where tuneful/ to more uneasy piano composition meets very subtle ambience, then Vermilion Hours will certainly reward you. It's just the shorter versions of the track that bugged me somewhat, as otherwise one could easily have the first two tracks on permanent repeat for a few hours- lulling in the prefect note placement, the subtle atmospherics, and low-key yin/yang of the pieces