Through Friendly Waters

Kettel, from the Netherlands, is a renowned name in electronica. This is the premiere release on a new label, Sending Orbs (sent directly to us from Europe!).

This album finds him doing very melody-centered glitch-hop/IDM, through Kettel has also done instrumental hip-hop and ambient (you can see strands of that in this album). Because of the strong and simple digital melodies, the whole thing strikes me as extremely videogame-ish. Not in a retro 8-bit NES way, but more modern. Think Nobuo Uemstasu (Final Fantasy composer) or Yasunori Mitsuda (Chrono Trigger composer). Lot’s of samples, interesting textures, and quirks make this a well-crafted work of electronica. Imagine Mum and Marumari, mixed together with a Playstation.

Recommended! Also, keep an eye out for this promising label...

Favorite Tracks: 2, 5, 6, 9

- Captain Dee, June 2005


Note: The album is mixed together, but tracks stand alone pretty well

*1. Happy chimes, simple melody, sound effects. Cute. (2:28)
**2. Hollow-ish keyboard, harp, and chime melodies intertwine over windy ambience. Magical vibe, like walking through a forest. Very Square-Enix. (4:16)
3. Messy IDM beat, bubbling electronics, wistful melody. (6:21)
*4. Deep lush ambience, slow IDM beat, field recording of a crowd plays quietly in the back. Pretty! (3:33)
***5. Tight click-clack beat, quiet bird noises, warm piano melodies. Later, touches of violin. Super addictive, so gorgeous! (4:18)
**6. Dancey IDM beat, cheery melody, cool rewind-ish ambient washes in the background. Lovely, but also fun. (6:15)
7. Sped-up hip-hop-ish beat. Light-hearted piano and digital melodies. Some muddled, depressing spoken samples make for a weird juxtaposition. (4:47)
*8. Bouncey beat, rhythmic clicks and snaps everywhere. Warm ethereal ambience, quiet echo-y chants, comforting electronic melody. (8:18)
**9. Bizarre creature-ish noises, soundtrack-ish ambience and garbled violin, slow repeated piano melody. 3:30 in, a hard-hitting glitchy hip-hop beat kicks in. Wow! Beautiful, mystical stuff. (8:40)