May Your Dreams Be Multicultural (Evermind - Amethystium)

Member Name: Frankingsteins

Product:	Evermind - Amethystium
Date:	13/01/08 (46 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Relaxing and eclectic ambience.

Disadvantages: Only suited for relaxation or background music, otherwise soon becomes repetitive and dull.

Amethystium is the Norwegian ambient/electronic/new age/darkwave/world music/relaxation sort of project of producer, programmer and multi-talented instrumentalist Øystein Ramfjord. While Ramjford's eclectic style of music doesn't engender him to the mainstream outside of vague recognition within the electronic world (metaphorically speaking, not some sort of Terminator-style future dystopia), this is easily approachable music that would doubtless be popular with many as relaxation music, though for the majority of listeners that's pretty much all there would be to it. There's a little more.

'Evermind' is the third Amethystium release, and though I'm not able to compare it to Ramfjord's other works that I haven't heard, it's a consistent if repetitive album of soothing mood music. Synthesising dreamy atmospheres underlined by soft but catchy beats and accentuated with more prominent melodies, a great deal of care has clearly been applied in tailoring the duration and sequence of each song's components to best create and enhance the engulfing mood. It's typical for a song to begin softly, or with no sound at all, and then spend the first half of its playing time in retention of that ambience (all songs are an easy four to five minutes in length) before indulging a little more in the second half when the listener is ready to accept an expanded soundscape of increased volume and intensity. The change is never jarring (though some of the keyboard solos are Jarre-ing), and the techno beats that invade and carry the majority of songs are mellow and quiet.

I'm not overly familiar with this style of music, but it certainly bears similarities to the ambient tradition developed with the technological advancements of the seventies, and often sounds like various stages of the careers of Vangelis, Tangerine Dream and other new age composers of the time all combined into a single song. Vangelis' excellent score for the film 'Antarctica' is the most direct comparison I can make, in the blending of smooth, dreamy synthesisers and an electronic beat that's accessible enough to be pop, though not in the same league of pop badness as 'Chariots of Fire.' The ambient side of things is enhanced through prominent use of a female singer for atmosphere, which borders on the work of Enya and that Minnie Riperton thing, but sounds really good. A male tenor also pops up on the final song.

There's no immediately apparent significance behind the arrangement of the songs, which are mostly isolated affairs that fade in and fade out and can often play out in a different style to their neighbours, or not. The first, third, ninth and tenth tracks are the most world/ambient pieces, the first being of particular note for including such obscure instruments as a didgeridoo within the mix as well as a prominent wind section (yes, yes, calm down), while the rest primarily favour the keyboards themselves. These tracks are catchy and enjoyable without being too imposing or distracting from the mood, but the keyboard melodies that develop do present the greatest deviation from the general ambience of the rest, particularly in 'Barefoot' where the grand synthesised overture reminds me distinctly of Brad Fiedel's theme from The Terminator, making the earlier electronic world idea a little more credible. 'Reverie' acts almost as a twinkling lullaby two-thirds of the way through the album, and I'm sure it will cause many eager listeners to consistently fail to recall what the last few songs sound like no matter how many times they play it, picking up their glass of port they similarly never remembered dropping and wondering when it got so dark outside.

1. Arcus
2. Into the Twilight
3. Shadowlands
4. Break of Dawn
5. Innocence
6. Satori
7. Barefoot
8. Reverie
9. Lost
10. Fable
11. Imagination

Summary: Øystein Ramfjord's third album as Amethystium (2004).