Templegarden's, "Done Rooms"

This album very pleasantly surprised me. I was a little skeptical coming into this album since 'Culture vs. Nature,' the earlier Templegarden's album, fell quite flat for me. And I've become very skeptical of Ant-Zen lately, since they have not been releasing quality material lately. But the extremely talented collective behind this multi-faceted act (Andrea Börner of Morgenstern, Andreas Schramm of Asche, Tim Kniep and Phillip Münch of Synapscape, along with some others) pulls through with a wonderfully deep ritual-ambient album.
The first track on the album, "Lure," sets the stage: percussive drumming that slowly increases in volume, the repetitive chanting of a monk (I'm a sucker for that), and deep, engaging atmospherics. A couple tracks are a little dull (that is, the ones that aren't as "ritualistic") but the good points more than make up for it. In fact, the album kinda leaves me wishing that more of the tracks were those wonderful ritual-drumming ones... but hey, I guess a balanace is nice. Definitely a worthy purchase for those into this style of music, and something you might want to give a try if you've never heard anything like it before.

samples:

• Lure
• Musshole Waltz
• Weeping Mountains High

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