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Piero Monachello is a propulsive musicmaker, and knows well how to keep the listener engaged. As Alluste his sequencers fire like the neurological mechanisms behind the mind's functioning, and help better align thought and mood toward a more positive current. His Alien Worlds (61'18") may be based on the 1970s Berlin-School, but it narrates from the present. Each work emerges and develops as in a slow gathering of hot blood. Still marveling at the beauty of synthetic sounds, the veteran Monachello sparks reactions and arouses emotions across eight tracks of brain beat Spacemusic. One does not listen to this music so much as drift into it. In a swirl of throwback synthesizers a tumbling latticework of echoing arpeggio notes dance along scales of nocturnal minor key chords. Lush harmonies sigh and whisper their celestial concord, as piano keys play out dramatically under digital reverberation. Full string sections may add warmth and fullness to one composition, as quickly as an ethereal vocal will leave us in a trackless void on another. Animated by the power of melody to convey emotions Alien Worlds stands strong against the harshness and cynicism that tears at the fabric of our world - and reminds us that we all still have our own feelings, questions and fears. While being all instrumental, Alien Worlds somehow manages to speak in a human vocabulary - requiring us to be beholden to something other than our own opinion. If you play this album, then you are agreeing to listen to Monachello's story. There is a spirit that this music catches you up in, yet it is meant only to serve us - and that which stirs in our deepest of hearts.
- Chuck van Zyl/STAR'S END 30 August 2018 |
