{"id":14268,"date":"2018-03-22T12:00:54","date_gmt":"2018-03-22T16:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=14268"},"modified":"2018-03-22T12:01:11","modified_gmt":"2018-03-22T16:01:11","slug":"album-review-ryan-summers-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2018\/03\/22\/album-review-ryan-summers-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Ryan Summers &#8212; ii"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-14269\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/ryan_summers_ii.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/ryan_summers_ii.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/ryan_summers_ii-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/ryan_summers_ii-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/>Picture this scene in your mind&#8217;s eye: a desolate, windswept landscape, mostly monochromatic and largely devoid of detail, yet with ominous pockets of darkness that suggest an unknown danger lurking just out of sight. What might the soundtrack for that scene be? Ryan Summers&#8217; <i>ii<\/i> provides one possible answer.<\/p>\n<p>A collection of synthesizer-based instrumentals, <i>ii<\/i> takes the listener on a sonic journey though Summers&#8217; world, one populated (or so the song titles would suggest) by elephants, shapeless forms, \u201cHypnotic Drones\u201d and \u201cMurky Depths.\u201d Those evocative titles do indeed telegraph the ambience of each of the ten cuts on <i>ii<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p>Fans of Tangerine Dream will find themselves in warmly (well, perhaps <i>icily<\/i> is a more apt adverb) familiar territory on cuts like \u201cSci-Fi Sequence\u201d and \u201cFrom the Coneflower.\u201d There&#8217;s more than a hint of loneliness and melancholy within the grooves on shimmering, contemplative cuts like \u201cTransactive Memory Partner,\u201d but if this is what melancholy sounds like, maybe it&#8217;s not such a bad feeling after all.<\/p>\n<p>Summers&#8217; minimalist yet expressive electronic instrumentation often suggests instruments that aren&#8217;t there; some of the textures on \u201cTransactive Memory Partner\u201d are evocative of a highly distorted electric guitar, an instrument that is wholly absent on <i>ii<\/i>. And despite the very analog character of the album, in actuality <i>ii<\/i> was created using \u201csoft synths\u201d (computer-based software), with Summers&#8217; only concession to the old-school production aesthetic being a real-life custom-built metal reverb plate through which he processed many of the album&#8217;s sounds.<\/p>\n<p>However he did it, with <i>ii<\/i> Ryan Summers has crafted an intriguing and meditative work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Picture this scene in your mind&#8217;s eye: a desolate, windswept landscape, mostly monochromatic and largely devoid of detail, yet with ominous pockets of darkness that suggest an unknown danger lurking [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14269,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,26,40,49,65],"tags":[3360],"class_list":["post-14268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ambient","category-electronica","category-instrumental","category-new-release","category-review","tag-ryan-summers","cat-5-id","cat-26-id","cat-40-id","cat-49-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14268"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14270,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14268\/revisions\/14270"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}