Alessandro Tedeschi's got a serious fixation with ice. A self described "glacial ambient" musician, he established the Glacial Movements label to release works evocative of the Arctic. Netherworld is Tedeschi's recording project intended to explore that aesthetic.

 

Glacial Movements

Morketid is a Nordic idiom used to describe the boreal winter. The region's harsh cold and lack of light were Tedeschi's inspiration, but the result is much tamer than its namesake. The component loops, synths, and field recordings are sparse and simply arranged, but alone those qualities alone don't evoke the polar landscape. The point would have been lost to me if not for the liner notes. Tedeschi genrates some pleasing sounds, but their charm is worn away by pridicible programming and plodding tempos. If anything, Morketid reminded me of an almost interminable direct flight from Portland to Germany a few years back. The plane crossed over Canada, Greenland and Iceland, but a heinous case of jet-lag induced insomnia prevented a full apprciation of the sights. The landscape the glided below me was beautiful, but I was too tired for it to make an impression.
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