Vidna Obmana — Soundtrack For The Aquarium
The seven-track sixty- nine minute release was originally conceived to be played in the Antwerp Zoo- where during 1993 it was on continuous playback. For the release, Serries utilizes the use of electronics, loops, tapes, flute, rainsticks, the human Voice & of course water sounds. And with these, he creates an extremely liquid, and lulling cascading take on the ambient form which slow trickles, bubbles, and drifts around you.
The seven tracks here between each run two and nineteen minutes apiece. Over the releases runtime, we move from slow warming & harmonic ripples, onto eerier & slow ebbing tone drifts, through to sliding & drift swirls, knocks & whistles. It really is an ambient release to both lose ones time & place within; as there really feels like there’s no beginning or end- hence why of course it worked well in its original continues play setting. Yet there is certainly both structure & flow here too- so you get the best of both worlds, meaning you can either play it as background sound, or more concentrated listening.
Certainly when ones plays Soundtrack For The Aquarium you think a both the haunting alien & beautiful flow and ebb of waterscapes, and underwater landscapes. Possible at times the water tones are a little overused and don’t have a terrible amount of variation about them- but I think if you get entranced enough by the whole thing this issue isn’t too pressing. Anyway, it’s great to see Zoharum reissuing past work from this euro ambient master- and let's hope there’s more in the works, as the project's discography has around 100 releases in its back-catalog.