Review: Throwing Snow - Embers

Second album by Ross Tones doesn't fail to disappoint with sprawling textures and a truly immersive soundscape.

 Throwing Snow's producer Ross Tones has made his mark in the Electronic music industry with this sophomore effort following on the heels of 2014's debut "Mosaic".

"Embers" begins - unsurprisingly - with the crackling embers of a fire, "Cantor's Dust (Part 1)" opens the album and builds the initial scene-setting to a steady beatless crescendo of noise before unleashing its half-brother track, "Cantor's Dust (Part 2)".  Going from a musical equivalent of looking out of a window on a cold day to see the majesty of the sunrise in "Part 1", "Part 2" moves into a bassy, synth-driven tune that utilises a series of crackles, pops and hums to create its underlay with an incessant rolling synth on top.

"Helical" expands further on this with an echo-filled and wavy tones, bringing the tune down at the end to allow the listener to experience cracks of thunder and birdsong, reconnecting us with the world outside.

As the thunder recedes, we are treated to "Allegory" which brings its signature notes up behind the tweeting of the birds and thunder before punching it into front and centre just over two thirds of the way through, allowing them to slide back and forth across the ears and bringing in a sparse beat to set us up for "Ruins".

Moving in 4/4 dub-step time, the deep strings sounds sit over the beats and then a gritty, harsh synth takes its place on the track, continuing to allow the listener to feel the continuity of thought within Tones' production.  It's no fluke this flows the way it does and why the whole album works almost like an ever-changing single track as opposed to several individuals that happen to sound great together.

"Gossamer's Thread" slows things down slightly to walking pace, creating an almost sense of anticipation of what may come, which is "Klaxon"....

Punching through the speakers is a foghorn-esque sound with light synth layered in, bringing slowly up in a crescendo and into focus a deep drum beat which pounds for over 2 minutes of the track before receding back into "Glissette", an essential slowing of "Klaxon" to an almost pseudo-reverse with church organ sound and slow build back up again.

"Recursion" is just over 6 minutes of well crafted magic, beginning with looped synths that layer to their beatless pinnacle in the first few minutes alongside a beautiful bass line.  The music is literally climbing over itself to get to the front of your ears and demand your attention before the beat comes in from behind the layers to take over, and with an incessant thump-thump-thump, the track jumps even more into life with an almost tribal feel.  Best track on the album.

"Pattern Forming"allows another temporary reprieve before taking some "Boards Of Canada"-style cues to take us through the hum, throb and ping of noises and scratchy-record sounds that make up its essence.

"Prism (Part 1)" and "Prism (Part 2)" takes us into an almost danceable territory with some slightly fractured beats, echoes and retro synth noises before segueing into "Cosms", throbs move to harsh synth layers which sound like computers talking to each other in code, before snapping into a syncopated beat where the notes roll up and down and bounce to create its path.

"Tesseract" is the closer, slowing the pace and providing a march for the last few minutes, as sounds and samples bounce in and out.  Tones strips away the beats, the bass and leaves us with bare synth and the crackling embers once more, before departing the way we started.

If I was to lay a minor criticism at the door of "Embers" it is that perhaps there could have been a little more variety in the synth sounds, but that really IS picking at it.

Easy to listen to, incredibly immersive and one to return to repeatedly, if this is the beginning of the output from "Throwing Snow" and Tones as a crafter of album material, I cannot wait to hear the next effort. 

9/10

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