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Ryan Teague, "Six Preludes"
Six songs of orchestral electronic suspension populate Ryan Teague's first album on Type Records and the majority of them are fairly bland examples of music I've heard before. I could toss the terms evocative or pretty or hypnotizing around all I wanted, but it wouldn't change the fact that I've heard better examples of this style elsewhere.
Type
Pick up a couple of Steve Reich records or give Arvo Pärt a chance and Teague's particularly static compositions will probably sound like an imitation of their style. Situated somewhere between the notion of sound pictures and the intellectual world of alternative composition, Teague's music often sounds incomplete and incoherent, wandering about aimlessly, swelling with all kinds of meaningless movement. A prelude is technically a piece of music that is supposed to introduce another piece or set of music, but these six preludes only introduce more introductions. It is a frustrating experience that conveys a sense of picturesque beauty without providing any context.
When Teague's magnificent strings break and swell with pride there's little to associate with their sound. I'm left waiting for some kind of dynamic shift to occur and it never comes. All the music simply fades away. With Teague teasing me like this, I almost wish he would've opted to keep his music less dramatic so that I wouldn't expect more from it. All of "Prelude III" is a gorgeous combination of piano and a skipping string track that sounds wonderful for the first two minutes or so. It never goes anywhere however and Teague simply adds new electronic noise to the track in order to keep the whole thing fresh. But he never quite gets to that point and unfortunately the whole thing fades away instead of moving naturally.
What's left after all the frustration is a record that would be perfect for sleeping or ignoring during a busy day. At times certain melodies might catch my attention because they are well written or simply stand out above the haze of sounds that populate the background, but I'm never compelled to give the record much thought. This is ambient music in the most Eno-like fashion. And just like Music for Airports there is a sense of serenity covering every note and synthetic process, but there is little to hold onto and fall in love with immediately. Unlike many ambient records, however, Teague has accomplished this odd serenity by maximizing the amount of sources he uses on each song. It's amazing how busy some of these songs actually are despite functioning as little more than background music.
Before I know it, "Prelude VI" is playing and I'm not too sure I remember a single melodic phrase from anywhere on the album. I remember hovering voices and twinkling piano, but nothing solid sticks out. "Prelude VI" sounds like a real song, however, and is the only track on the album to possess a real beginning, middle, or end. Ryan Teague's personal touch stands out most on this final prelude, removing itself from whatever academic background it might have and touching more personal and effective themes through its use of rhythm and mechanical sound. Once it ends I'm left with that track and that track alone stuck in my head. I'll listen to the entire album all the way through just to have it surprise me one more time, but it will be the only thing I care about in the end. Teague clearly knows how to orchestrate both modern and classical instruments, but it is his inability to arrange and fulfill the promise of his own compositions that make this album flounder more than soar.
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