“We can't say no to an offer as musical and generous as this one”
1 Fragments of Eternity 12:14
2 Signals 5:38
3 Empty Space 8:47
4 Alone in the Dark 4:08
5 Island of Infinity 16:00
6 Ground Control 6:38
7 Gravity 9:22
(DDL 62:50) (V.F.)
(Ambient Music)
An album of meditative ambient music by Robert Kalyos to start 2022 is quite appropriate as the Italian synthesist has developed a melodious writing style throughout his albums. Offered on the principle of name your price, FRAGMENTS OF ETERNITY proposes nearly 63 minutes of floating music where the shivers run through our emotions, even while we sleep. A very beautiful album where gratuity does not rhyme at all with mediocrity!
However, the title-track makes us hear a circadian beat in a thick layer of mystical mist. Reverberating strands adorn its procession, which is embellished by a melodious sweet performance and yet melancholic by a pianist imbued with nostalgia. His notes tinkle with a radiant echo effect that makes this evasive melody so addictive. The beats become more intense, even speeding up the pace slightly, while humming orchestrations enhance the very elegiac aspect of Fragments of Eternity. Yes, Vangelis has his fingerprints on this spleen-tinged melody! Subtly changing tonal sensibility, the piano falls silent a few seconds before the 6th minute. The beats also melt into this haze a bit further, leaving those voices hum in the discreet orchestrations over a good lyrical distance up until the synth is trumpeting like good Vangelis. Impossible to resist this track by Robert Kalyos which spoils the ears of all romantics here, as FRAGMENTS OF ETERNITY blows the hot and cold of meditative ambient music. If the melodious approaches have what it takes to warm the souls, other titles propose an unknown vision of the musician with reverberating shadows that criss-cross the sonic unknown. Signals gives us a glimpse of the other side of FRAGMENTS OF ETERNITY with a linear movement that barely undulates and lives on a rumbling mass of sound where a synth attempts a communication with the unknown. This is beautiful atmospheric music with a pleasant modulation in the synth's chant. Further listening picks up on those stealthy whispers that are well buried in the reverberating mass. Empty Space's cosmic journey is less intimidating. It's like hearing a celestial cloud singing in the void and meeting an electro-acoustic phenomenon, beyond the 6th minute, that sends a charge of muffled vibrations. A bit like giving life to an inert matter. But it's not violent enough to bring us out of our meditative state. The opening of Alone in the Dark is dramatic with almost philharmonic layers of synth stretching out their fictitious harmonies as they curl like specters on a bed of ominous crumplings. The piano also echoes its glassy notes on this short rumbling movement. The devil's share!
Just like Fragments of Eternity, Island of Infinity justifies the necessity to download this album offered for free by the Italian musician. The movement follows that of an ambient Berlin School with this time piano tears which are harmony with the impulse of the music. Seraphic voices coat the very poetic outline of this good track that goes through a transitional phase in its middle. Keyboard-guitar riffs follow in a sequenced suite, slightly accelerating the rhythm of Island of Infinity which ends in another good Berlin School, also quite meditative, with a musical envelope that breathes Pyramid Peak's. A great track! Ground Control follows with a tinge of dark ambient music with reverberating effects that detach in arcs of sounds. Bluish laments escape from this slow movement that develops into a cosmic waltz more elaborate than in the first part of Alone in the Dark. Regarding the pearls of tenderness from this album, Gravity distances itself from the first two with a splendid orchestral movement that gives us a good dose of these shivers of exaltation, so much it is beautiful, soft and poetic. The title takes what is most beautiful in Fragments of Eternity and Island of Infinity. That's why it's the most beautiful. That and the fact that I can imagine an astronaut shedding a few tears when hearing it!
This Album is dedicated to all the people, women and men who have ventured and sacrificed, in all these years, to the exploration of the cosmos, of space, and to all those who have in one way or another, participated in order to realize the various projects of the many journeys to the unknown world of the universe. This statement comes from Robert and explains it all! If you are interested, there is also a maxi-single of the title Island of Infinity which is offered on the same principle of name your price. We can't say no to an offer as musical and generous as this one. A very nice initiative from Robert Kalyos.
Sylvain Lupari (February 1st, 2022) *****
Available at Robert Kalyos' Bandcamp
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