Another perennial favorite label of mine is Constellation Tatsu, the Oakland-based purveyors of finely-hewn monolithic soundscapes. The label’s paradigm of batch-based release schedules leads to periodic doses of gorgeous textures in both the aural and visual orbits. The Winter 2019 batch is a quartet of goodness, peaked by this lovely salvo of sound from Austin’s Curved Light (a.k.a. Peter Tran).
Flow and Return exists on many spheres: Tangerine Dream-esque oceans of sound, expertly-sequenced synth dramas, and ornately decorated dronescapes. Most of the pieces clock in at under two minutes in length, but there is a tremendous amount of content packed into each minuscule capsule. “Brightlea” wanders in with a warped yet lush sensibility, before morphing into the shimmering ocean of “Sea Change”. A crackling glitch carries “Glacial Float” along into the melodic sunset of “Crescent / Visions in Eclipse”, which is a five-minute mini-masterpiece.
The endless beams of energy continue to pour from Tran’s synth-infused limbs over the course of a total of fourteen different pieces of music. Present are shades of the previously mentioned Tangerine Dream, as well as the gurgling textures of Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and the arpeggiated melodies that seem to weave their way into the oeuvres of many of the Austin electronic wizards with which he rubs elbows. Yet Tran throws a whole lot of himself into his music, such that it ends up becoming a synergistic brew that transcends his influences and bears his unique stamp.
Bathe in the cascading sonic textures by warping over to the Constellation Tatsu Bandcamp, and snap up the entire Winter 2019 batch, why don’t you? You’ll thank me later…
