Multiforms

Marconi Union's new album Multiforms: Ambient Transmissions Vol. 3 comes out today, six pieces of deep ambient music, each around eight minutes long, that form a single whole, each track merging itself into the next. The long slow opening into Multiforms I, drones and sound gently building, breaks at five minutes with a wordless voice and synths sounds that bend towards the light, a gentle ascent. Multiforms II drifts in with the sound of wind and then synth tones. The beatlessness and weightlessness continues as II segues into III, a movement with a piano line taking the lead, rising and falling over the drone. 

IV picks up and a rhythm kicks in, not a drum but something approaching a pulsebeat that propels us forwards, arpeggios gradually pulling clear of a distorted fuzz. Insistent and hypnotic. Multiforms V has layers of sound, more drones, an electric bass possibly, an oscillating topline and then a clear and rich ringing melody line, coming from I think a clarinet. The final part is VI, a return to blur and haze, ringing drones and long keening notes, Marconi Union bringing us through to the end slowly and a gentle, slightly melancholy conclusion. Trip over. 

The album is available at Just Music along with much of the rest of their back catalogue. There's a full length visualiser of Multiforms Vol. 3 to add to the immersive experience, the visuals to accompany the audio.

This is last year's Marconi Union album, their twelfth, Fear Of Never Landing- another full length immersive deep listening experience, very much an album to unplug from the world and surrender to for the time it plays.