“Trances” is Robert Rich’s other 1983 album, and stylistically, it’s much like “Drones”, but sees him expanding his sound palette, add clarity to his production, and creating more evocative, complicated sound environments.

“Cave Paintings” begins like the pieces on “Drones”…  a pleasant loop, this time of what sounds like sped up cricket sounds, establishes a backdrop for a warm drone with shifting, resonant harmonics.  Extended synth improvisations introduce themselves.  This time, though, shimmering, golden sounds that could easily have originated from a rhodes piano rise in liquid arpeggiations compliment the chords.  The song feels, at risk of waxing overly poetic, like light shining through honey.  The mix is much more clear and three dimensional.  Several minutes before the song ends, most of the drone drops out, leaving the sound environment strangely empty.  Though it never becomes outright threatening, like some of the material on “Drones” and “Sunyata”, by the end, this emptiness has given risen to new synth themes that are quite mournful and nostalgic.  All in all, an amazing track.

The second track, “Hayagriva” is more spacious, less melodic, and feels very dry.  The bassy drone from the previous track returns, but definitely feels a little less warm, a little less sympathetic.  A, sparkling, crisp electronic buzz that would sound like power lines overhead if it didn’t resonate in such a pretty major chord crackles quietly in the background.  It brings to mind images of ruins in the open desert.  The usual slow synth chords do eventually enter, but create little human feeling to sympathize with beyond a vague sense of anticipation.  The movement of the piece is again reminiscent of clouds, but this time other sounds are present to remind the listener that they are on the ground, looking up.  Near the end, it’s as if the wind begins to pick up, and a longing, airy chord overwhelms the mix for another somber ending.

In conclusion, both these pieces are fantastic, and “Trances” is a must have Robert Rich album.  Highly recommended to anyone not opposed to the concept of ambient space music.  5 stars.

Tags: Robert Rich Discography

Following “Sunyata”, the long form, beatless spacy pieces would continue for the following pair of albums, “Trances” and “Drones”, both released on cassette in 1983.  Each contains two pieces around half an hour in length.  They still have that time-eating ’sleep concert’ feeling, as well as the youthful, raw intensity of their predecessor album.  First to be discussed is “Drones”…

With opener “Seascape”, Rich created his first real masterpiece.  Half an hour of sound that may have been improvised, but regardless creates a coherent world.  Mournful, wandering, anxious thoughts rush quietly over the sounds of shore in the form of warm synth chords.  Song title and sound have combined to become Rich’s first real theme piece.  It’s a song for a sunset on the coast, sketched, it would seem, by someone with plenty of demons and preoccupations.   The dark, unsettling feel of “Sunyata” continues here.  The production is the same thick, soupy murk.  This time, however, Rich seems to have a clearer idea of what he’s going for.  By the end of the piece, we’ve drifted a long way from where we started.  A pure, resonant guitar echoes across the surface of the water from miles away, the first inkling of the ambient guitar sound he’d use so much in later years.  “Seascape” fades out.

The other piece from the original release, “Wheel of Earth”, is a lot more static, and reminds me of watching clouds pass slowly overhead.  The whooshing, airy sound of the song, as well as its overall pacing, are very reminiscent of clouds, and recall Steve Roach’s work.  Hauntingly slow, lonely synth notes ring like sirens in the mist.  A feeling of hugeness is achieved.  It’s not as emotionally involving as “Seascape”, but still transports the listener, and hypnotizes the listener the same way as can the gradual movement of the clouds.  A solid track, although modern technology has helped this kind of thing greatly in the last couple decades.  Just check out Steve Roach and Vidna Obmana’s “Well of Souls” double album to see what I mean.

The third track, the shorter, 12 minute “Resonance”, is only available on the double disk reissue, but since that’s the only edition available anymore, most people will hear this track.  The song is what its title indicates, pretty much - a cold, distant, resonant hum, evoking industrial machines with their hums and whirs, but so far underwater that theor sounds are rounded, faint, more like ghosts.  It’s an uneventful, simple but remarkably dark piece.

In conclusion, “Drones” contains 3 solid tracks that all explore different realms in their lengthy running times.  If all 3 tracks were as powerful as “Seascape”, it would easily be a 5 star album, but as it is, I would say it deserves a 4 in its original form, and a 4.5 with the addition of “Resonance”, which, unlike “Wheel of Earth”, does not overstay its welcome, or feel at all dated.  I recommend this to anyone interested in Rich, but it shouldn’t be the first album of his they hear.  Only “Seascape” is among his best work.

Tags: Robert Rich Discography