Werner Dafeldecker & Lawrence English — Fathom Tides

Earth's surface is roughly seventy-one percent water, and with our bodies being a little shy of that percentage as well, one can see why water is such a frequent source of artistic inspiration. Werner Dafeldecker and Lawrence English team up for their third release together, Fathom Tides, to investigate and explore costal environments, tides, and the cyclical changes found all over our vast world with the question in mind: "What impact do we have on the world we inhabit?" The seven pieces on Fathom Tides were all born from coastal field recordings by English which where then treated by Dafeldecker, along with his addition of some further electronics.

Fathom Tides doesn't single out any location and each track is just a number in progression. This allows the duo to let their interpretations move beyond the locus of recording and spread each piece globally. Coming together, melding into almost one, continuous work, Fathom Tides is seven soundscapes of varying intensity, but all very reserved, focusing more on the shifts/changes on an ideological level instead of over the top crashing waves and in your face, on the nose samples. It's an interesting work where on the surface, it feels very minimal, with subtle drones and languid pacing. However, as the saying goes, still waters run deep, and each track has a lot to unpack when the listener is ready to climb into the diving bell. With that, Fathom Tides works extremely well on headphones with adequate volume, transforming the pieces into fully enveloping works that can get dangerously claustrophobic at times. Although there is an almost constant rainfall or other naturalness throughout, the heavy, low drone exudes an industrial quality, something manmade and synthetic breaking through the natural order of things. Deep, reverberating oscillations are a major part of Fathom Tides, and the thickness adds to the immersion factor for the listener. Moving slowly and deliberately, the pieces almost feel like they're not moving at all, but like a raft on the tide, there is movement even if it's unnoticed. It is pretty easy to get caught up in the album, oddly soothing and hypnotic, but for very hard to explain reasons. I guess that's like our fascination with the sea, time, and tide.

Fathom Tides is Dafeldecker and English's third release together and second on Hallow Ground (the other being 2023's Tropic of Capricorn). Well recorded and deftly treated, the album creates a large and abstract soundscape that flows as well as the bodies of water that inspired it. Deep and immersive, Fathom Tides is a great piece of sound art that is enjoyable and engaging, increasing in complexity upon each spin.