We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Beyond the dark zones

by Cristiano Bocci

/
1.
2.
3.
My Day Noise 06:04
4.
The Night 09:11
5.
6.
Evil Pain 04:06
7.
8.
Respiro 05:47

about

Cristiano Bocci’s Beyond the Dark Zones does just what its title promises. It takes us beyond the heavy sounds of dark ambience—not only beyond them, but through them. Bocci’s poetics is rooted in the electronic soil of texture-based music; the plant that grows from it is a multi-faceted, many-branched thing.

First, the electronics. Bocci is a skilled creator of audio software; many of the programs he uses to generate and manipulate sound are his own custom designs. These are basic compositional tools for him; with them he composes floating drones and dirges, thickly woven textures of overlapped and interleaved timbres, stretched and compressed tones, basic motifs that are looped, granulated, and otherwise transfigured.

But for all their ability to expand on the possibilities of sound-as-sound, the electronics are ultimately in the service of the music. Many of the compositions on Beyond the Dark Zones seamlessly incorporate acoustic instruments, modal tonalities, and cyclical rhythms into surrounding electronic frameworks of varying abstraction. Bocci has a fine ear for creating ad hoc instrumental ensembles from disparate parts; brass, reeds, piano, and even the human voice all have a place here, along with Bocci’s signature 6-string electric bass. One of the most striking features of the album, in fact, is its unusual employment of trumpet or flugelhorn as the melodic voice in an electronic setting.
Certainly, the aesthetic core of the album is defined by the deep pitches and minor keys of dark ambience as well as by an associated sensibility, but this is a point of departure rather than a destination reached at the end of a cul-de-sac. Along the way, there are echoes of jazz and slowed-down jazz fusion, hints of field recordings, harmonies of a multi-tracked brass ensemble, down-tempo electronica, portentous prog rock, spoken word performance, and choral music.
Ultimately, in Beyond the Dark Zones, genre is an irrelevance; creative interfusion is of the essence.

Daniel Barbiero

credits

released September 22, 2022

REVIEWS

The Sound Projector
www.thesoundprojector.com/2023/02/09/beyond-the-dark-zones

Avant Music News
avantmusicnews.com/2022/09/24/amn-reviews-cristiano-bocci-beyond-the-dark-zone-2022-unexplained-sounds-group

The New Noise
www.thenewnoise.it/cristiano-bocci-beyond-the-dark-zones


Music composed by Cristiano Bocci

Cristiano Bocci: electric basses, electric upright bass, contro-baritone 8, string guitar, electronics, synths, drum programming.
Paolo Acquaviva: trombone on tracks 5, 6 and 8
Gianluca Becuzzi: voice on track 4
Mara Lepore: piano on track 8
STIGMATE (a.k.a. Nicola Locci): noise on track 2
Emiliano Nencioni: trumpet and flugelhorn on tracks 2, 3, 4, 5, and 8
Diego Rossi: baritone saxophone on tracks 5, 6 and 8

Published by Unexplained Sounds Group
Mastered by Raffaele Pezzella
Artwork by Marinella Caslini / DisGrafica Atelier
© 2022. All rights reserved

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Unexplained Sounds Group Italy

Global Network of Aural Disorientation curated by Raffaele Pezzella

Subsidiaries:

eighthtowerrecords.bandcamp.com

reversealignment.bandcamp.com

zerok.bandcamp.com

therecognitiontest.bandcamp.com

sonologyst.bandcamp.com

Magazine: www.patreon.com/eighthtower

Magazine:
www.patreon.com/eighthtower
... more

contact / help

Contact Unexplained Sounds Group

Streaming and
Download help

Shipping and returns

Redeem code

Report this album or account

Unexplained Sounds Group recommends:

If you like Beyond the dark zones, you may also like: