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Review:
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I have been listening to Loscil for 24 years.
Or, to put it another way, the ambient sounds
of Loscil have been a constant companion to me
for, well, this century so far.
This will be my ninth review (!) of something
by Loscil, and yet I have reviewed less than
half of his recorded output. Ambient
electronic artists are, if nothing else, very
productive.
In all of this time that I have been
listening to this artist, I have always
wondered how to pronounce the name. Once when
I was buying a Loscil CD at Criminal Records
in Little 5 Points, the clerk behind the
counter referred to him as "low skul" or maybe
"low skil", but I have also heard the name
pronounced "loss sill" on Album 88, while I
tend to say "loss ill". Maybe someone should
add a pronunciation guide to his Wikipedia
page.
Speaking of which, there is a line on the
Wiki page that I don't remember ever seeing
before: "The name Loscil is taken from the
'looping oscillator' function (loscil) in
Csound." Huh. Given that, I think that "loss
ill" is the correct pronunciation. But
whatever.
Loscil is the project of Scott Morgan, and he
has been doing this for a while. This album is
produced by Lawrence English, who Morgan
collaborated with for 2023's Colours
of Air. The two work
together well.
Last summer, Kranky records
re-released Triple
Point, Loscil's debut
record, on vinyl, and being a completist nerd
and something of a vinyl snob, I snatched up a
copy. After re-immersing myself in that
record, I find that Lake Fire
represents a lot of growth.
On the debut record, Loscil's music was a
haze that operated over a, well, a looping
oscillator sound. That is, those tunes tended
to have a wavering beat and then some stuff
happening over top. That is simplifying it a
lot, but that was the basic structure. After
over two decades of refining his sound.
Morgan's music now seems denser, more complex.
I do not say that to denigrate the earlier
records, which I do love, but more to say that
this one seems a lot more complicated.
There are several tracks that really stand
out to me. Bell Flame pairs the ebb
and flow looping oscillator sound with a nice
piano bit, a steady tapping that reminds me of
Underworld's Best Mamgu Ever. On
Candling, the piano bit reminds me more
of Harold Budd,
especially his work on The Moon and the
Melodies, here floating over
Morgan's drone to a lovely effect.
But the album is called Lake Fire
and is about wildfires in the Pacific
Northwest, where Morgan lives. I live in a
damp rainforest city, so fires aren't really a
concern, but the footage I see of the fires
out west is frightening. Morgan channels a
sense of nervousness and fear very well on Silos
and Ash Cloud.
Silos starts out with a wavering
drone, as so many Loscil tracks do, but layers
slowly build, adding tension, until at 2:10, a
shuffling brushed drum beat is suddenly joined
by a deep bass thud. The thud comes out of
nowhere and hits you in the chest -- it's a
shock, which really works in the context of
music about wildfires.
On the other hand, Ash Clouds is a
song of constant nervousness. Sounds billow
and flow, seeming expanding, a billowing
anxiety. It never lets up, just growing,
flowing, surrounding.
But the whole thing is interesting, and it
all flows together very well, something that
Loscil always does on his records.
So, 24 years in, I continue to be impressed.
However, I have to note that people who do not
enjoy songs of billowing ambience will not
really find music to like here. I know that
some people (such as my partner) find this
music "boring". Well, this won't convince them
otherwise. But for those of us who like it, Lake
Fire is another fun release.
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