“If you love great and strong cosmic rock with nice psychedelic aromas, the music of The Roswell Incident will meet your tastes”
1 Escape I 29:15
2 Escape II 27:43
(CD-r 56:58) (V.F.)
(Vintage psychedeli-cosmic rock)
I adore this tone of flute enchantress which extricates itself from the claws of nothingness! It sings a seraphic ode and its solitary charms call other flutes, shier, to join and give a small concert of soft oniric breezes. There is a delicate gradation in these ambient melodies, so that the intro slightly touches at times some ephemeral dramatic moods which remind me the birth of Ricochet's muddled rhythms. This gives more relief to this ambiospherical painting which bickers constantly with ethereal elements. The astral singings dress of sibylline harmonies when the sparklings to the metallic reflections dilute the songs of the flutes in order to bring Escape I towards a more intense passage where the ambio-cosmic moods bring to life a structure of beat which staggers in an awkward way at the 5th minute spot. And this relatively ambient pace draws a kind of slow morphic cha-cha which dances beneath a thick cloud of synth layers painted of prismic breezes and of lascivious violin veils. The moods become then ambio-cosmic and decorate a slow sequenced walking where are whistling and blowing a thick cloud of astral colors synth lines. The beat of Escape I sways hips like a spirit in a soporific trance in a garden of honey where stars are within reach. The synth pads are as much in love as ethereal and their caresses are comforting a hearing which waits for the rhythm to become more accentuated. And the nothingness sucks up the sound elements. Only the dark winds which make ring the carillons reign over this very meditative passage. This is the war of the airwaves. The war of synth lines of which the cracklings get lost in the dusts of stars where only weak ringings resist the winds. These ringings eventually form a skeleton of spheroidal rhythm. They turn into a ballet of sequences with the doubles of their shadows which dance in parallel in some sonic glares a bit dramatic. And if we listen carefully, we hear these gleaming sequences which made dance our dreams in Mirage. Except that the rhythm gets loose and makes other bass sequences which are trotting and banging vigorously. Chthonian singings invade this powerful and linear rhythm of which the gallop is flowing with a beautiful fluidity under solos of synth filled by the aromas of howling spectres. The roarings of what seems to be Martenot 's waves are switching for wonderful violin flights with a mellotron of which the burning sibylline airs pursue the curves of a rhythm which runs at a brisk pace. A structure of beat with a very beautiful meshing of sequences which criss-cross their chords and their overlappings, forming an electronic rhythm with such a fluidity which reminds enormously Klaus Schulze in the Body Love albums. We are riveted to our armchair, ears on the alert, to follow this deep tempo from where the only outcome seems to be inevitably a crash. A crash which will lead the last seconds of Escape I in a heap of metal and mirror which burst between the ears which have never expected this kind of finale. Nevertheless, if we recall well the ambiences of Body Love...
With two long tracks and their deliciously ambient intros which unblock over rhythms fighting constantly with intensely cosmic atmospheres, this last The Roswell Incident's album is a strong one which will revive the flame of our souvenirs of Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream in their beautiful 70's. ESCAPE is the outcome of a concert given by brothers Jan and Koen Buytaert within the framework of B-Wave Festival, held in Belgium, in December 2013. The Roswell Incident has reworked the music in studio with a result which reaches the parameters of the very good album The Crash. Yes, it's still about EM. Again! Shall say some … Maybe but The Roswell Incident affixes a very personal seal with a cosmic approach which allows to merge marvellously the rhythms and the atmospheres of these 2 icons of the German EM. So, goes Escape II. The intro shows an ambient beat which leans on somber beatings. The moods are very dark with a kind of strange dialogue of metallic sounds which float as hoops without ends in the wandering sinister synth lines and their tortuous spectral harmonies. A note of piano falls at around the 5th minute. Hesitating, this piano reveals its naked notes and draws a somber passive and meditative melody, adding some more mysticism to Escape II which takes life with somber felted sequences. The movement becomes nervous. The keys skip and pound in a rather undisciplined rhythmic choreography. Superb solos with ghostly and sharpened harmonies overhang this anarchic rhythm while other sequences, clearly more incisive, redirect the structure of rhythm towards a more methodical phase. I hear Under The Dome's The Demon Haunted World here. And Escape II reveals its superb rhythmic schema with a mixture of sequences of which the criss-crossed lines let hear a figure of rhythm as lively than harmonious. The pace becomes more punchy with keys which pound of an arrhythmia to lose breath. Even the synth solos have difficulty to follow it. Mists to the metallic drizzle are hooting over this frenzy which eventually rides alone and throws itself in an oasis of serenity where ambiospherical elements will restrain its powerful swiftness.
One of the great qualities in the music of The Roswell Incident is this ease that the Buytaert duet has to mix ambiences, as Gothic and as cosmic, to rhythms which fast become objects of seduction. The movements of sequencers are as much attractive than the ambiences which tame them. And this small wink of eye, quite discreet, to the masters of retro analog EM adds a very charming dimension to a music which doesn't really need it, to gain an enviable place among these big names. If you love great and strong cosmic rock with nice psychedelic aromas, you will spend some very good moments with this ESCAPE from The Roswell Incident. Simply great EM and strongly recommendable!
Sylvain Lupari (September 7th, 2014) *****
Available at The Roswell Incident Bandcamp
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