An unusual concept it’s quite mindful in a new age-y way but while not everything ignites on this gong laden, percussion, singing bowls (natch) ‘n’ trumpet duo setting, some passages work very effectively indeed.
I’d skip ‘Byway,’ the weakest of the tracks by far. But ‘Lonely Road’ works very well. It is the track to return to most. Some of Martin Pyne’s work, especially his excellent album Spirits of Absent Dancers, springs to mind at this juncture as a kindred spirit stylistically.
Jim Howard alternating splodgy trumpet with tonally characterful flugel and contributing electronics operates in a Nils Petter Molvær or Arve Henriksen like space, meaning the blend is ambient and fragmentary that’s a bit Nordic and that is very appealing on a track like ‘You Can See Your Home From Here’. The live electronics and loops in some passages I’m a bit meh about for instance on ‘Catching the Dawn’ however.
Inspired all this, according to the label, by Julie Walkington’s desire to combine her experience of playing gongs in a sound healing setting as part of her work as a therapist, with her career as a bass player.
A live in the studio recording full of first takes file loosely under kind of om. There’s method in the mantra – it’s not at all a case of gong for a burton.
