Regular Columnists

Artist: Stephanie Sante
Genre: Electronic
CD Review:
Stephanie Sante has conceived some rather brilliant bytes of electronica, just a bone separating it from the space of Eno and the rhythmic beauty of Schulze or Tangerine Dream. Except for Wendy Carlos, I’ve never heard a woman at the helm of such music, and I’d rather listen to Sante over a Tron score any day. (Don’t hit me!!)

On the 6th moment of ‘Iridescence’ now, my mind is slipping into a silk sock and hanging itself away from the cares of the oil-driven world. It is one of the most ambient tracks, repetitious like lite water torture and yet there is no pain involved. The synthesizer and dripping sounds combine with other little ends and odds to quiet down the house. Just for a moment.

‘Unseen’ spirits us back to a world of steam and smoke, as if we’re chugging silently along in a boat on a seldom traveled stream of no importance. The left ear has a constant white noise that after a while breaks up from steam into something recognizable. Yes. Now it’s ­ a chorus of daytime bugs that swelter and huddle in summer. And then, at the end. It seems to all evaporate, slipping into the osmosis of life, with the help of the mock turtle of an acoustic guitar.

Finding poetic phrases to explain such instrumentals is neither forced nor difficult when artists like Sante finish their part. Then, it is up to the listener to grab, glow and go with personal feelings, as individual to the experience as the room they sleep in. A pop song does it all for you. Thru words, you are driven and have no say at directions, speed, length. When ‘Alchemy’ is touched, though you know that it’s a 4:37 minute track, if you don’t watch the clock, it will take as long as you wish it to take. That is the delight.

This is a cd made by mp3.com. Just shows you the kind of stuff you will be surprised, and grateful, to find at that undiscovered artists’ colony.