Ambitious avant-garde/classical/conduction. A kitchen sink production that has ample elements of classical contemporary chamber, jazz improv, spoken word, electronics, and treated samples. A general air of melancholy hangs over much of the album. The piece is "inspired" by the book 1"=25 mi. by Sumner Carnahan. Recordings of people reading excerpts are layered underneath portions of music and the human voice is defintely on display...but taking many forms (whispered narratives, foreign languages, singing abstract sounds, heavily treated, and looped). All tracks are interesting, listen to them all (10 + 11 aren't representative of 1-9 tho). European feel on 1-3. Jazz feel on 2,3,6. Intelligible narratives on 2-4,6,8,9. Experimental electronics + sounds treatment on 1,4,8,11 (all tracks really). Partch-y percussion on 4,8. Beat/repetition on 5,8. Worldy 7,9,10. No FCCs detected. A good mixture of arts and farts.

Pick any track, sit back, and stare at nothing.

1-(9:21) Sinister electronic whirring(s). Dramatic cello. Looped (foreign?) vocals. -5:40 pensive bassoon.
2-(7:41) Slow intertwined melody between bassoon, vox, viola, cornet. Incongruously interrupted by rapid, stuttering voice + loose supple jazz drums. Nervous. Then two merge.-2:20 river of voices. Last 20 sec slow fade.
3-(6:35) Sparse track. String Harmonics + squeaks. Whispering. Narratives. Beautiful Bartok-y viola solo and cornet jazz solo over quiet narrative.
4-(5:45) Gentle machine clatter and recorded vox noise and narrative (about supernatural?). Subtle percussion. Scary ending.
5-(3:08) Sliding intro. Gentle rocking rhythm coalesces around bassoon, viola, looped vox, and muted kick dr. Oud, cornet and vox samples on top.
6-(6:17) Tense, fast pitter-patter snare and hi-hat. Angry out-there socio-political vocal narratives. Treated vox weaves with jazz drum solo. cornet mimcs vox.
7-(4:58) Wandering Oud over echoes of vox murmur. Bassoon, cello enters. Vaguely spiritual. -1:00 only 5 quiet vox narratives are left.
8-(5:43) Herky-jerky percussion. Distinct vox narrative. -3:43 Strings+bassoon chug along with cornet melody. -2:43 telephone rings 2x and intensity+volume picks up with pounding perc, weird elec.
9-(6:55) Clean fem vox. singing vowel sounds with tribal perc. Clear male narrative in French until -2:35. Orchestral long tones. -:25 5 quiet vox narratives.
10-(4:25) Beautiful middle-easterny Uniflute solo over vocal soundbed that drops out 2/3 way through. -:20 silence to end.
11-(9:59) No chamber or live vox. Just heavily spliced and overlapped samples of voices, to the point it sounds almost like a river. Scary elec. sounds hidden underneath. The gimmick: every word from 1"=25 mi is uttered at least once.