Gradations

They Say...

Review by Jason Birchmeier, All Music Guide

The ambient soundscapes of Gradations, producer Mike Martinez's debut album for Mille Plateaux as Electric Birds, explore a diverse array of tiny yet remarkably melodic sounds. It's not the individual sounds themselves that are melodic, but rather the way Martinez combines them into subtle layers of complementary soundscapes. For these layers, he manages to find uncanny sounds that seem purely alien under normal circumstances, sounds definitely confined to his laptop rather than the natural world. Not all the sounds themselves are actually ambient, either. In fact, many of the sounds Martinez employs happen to be quite harsh -- dissonant noises intended to contrast the overlying melodic ambience. Yet when these grating sounds get looped below the more melodic ones, the effect is very calming. For instance, the title track lays down a foundation of bubbling water and bouncing bass beats while the album's closing song, "Rian," sounds downright horrific with its forbidding mechanical aura. For the most part, though, Martinez concentrates on a lighter shade of ambience, and of the more soothing moments is the ten-minute "Painted Room." Somehow though, even the harsh moments like "Gradations" and "Rian," late in the album, seem soothing. By the time you reach them, you're already so lulled that you don't notice the turn toward darkness. Whether light or dark, Gradations wows you with its tiny, almost undetectable nuances and mesmerizing melodies. Martinez's past work had foreshadowed an album like this, but only during isolated moments. Here, you get an entire album of the artist at his most meticulously tranquil, and that's fitting since Gradations is his first release for Mille Plateaux, a label recognized for excellence.