Loren Nerell’s love affair with ambient music and its endless diversities have its roots firmly fed by the music of Tangerine Dream, who themselves, have had immeasurable influence on many of ambient composers in the history of the style.
Nerell is well studied in the art of sound manipulation, and experienced in the recording of several albums of ambient sounds, especially in the art of Gamelan music, a style of Bali sound. On his seventh solo release, Slow Dream, Loren Nerell steps into the nether regions of the mind to soundtrack the unknown worlds of dreams.
Slow Dream contains four compositions that are each unique, and uniquely eerie in their expressive attempt to softly provide, not a story, but a tone that replicates the misty, intangible dream worlds that we occupy.
“Mentalon”, the first of the four, is a nearly half-hour ‘lost path’ trek through uncertain curtains, behind which we know nothing that exist. The droning tones are soft, and increasingly familiar but never let up nor venture too far from the close walled corridors that it implies you are walking through.
It’s followed by the 10-minute “Slow Dream”, a foreboding piece that is reminescent of Tangerine Dream works, yet retains Nerell originality. It fills the dream world with billowing dark clouds, cool to the face, devoid of life, as you walk through them.
This effective album is completed with “A Sense of Presence” (19:28), and a beautiful but short “Persistence of Dream Imagery”.
It is recommended that you can listen to this drifting off to sleep, or at low volumes throughout the day for a calming effect. I would suggest a complete ‘closed-eyes’ session with this album, preferably before heading off to bed. Regardless of your listening methods, the experience is mesmerizing, more so the deeper attention you pay to the composed sounds.
In Nerell’s dreamscapes, you are truly alone. Sometimes, that’s a place we need to be.
Release Date: July 17, 2012
—Matt Rowe