Padilla, Craig

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2022
Veteran electronic composer-experimenter Craig Padilla’s Discovery of Meaning is a celebration of the endless lessons brought by living in the present, and he invites the listener into the intimacy of a single instant. A personal and contemplative record, Discovery of Meaning paints in sounds from across Padilla’s career. Elements of electronica, trance, new age, drone, ambient, and cosmic space music blend into something unique and spellbinding, though Padilla’s environment is also a significant influence. He draws from modular synth explorations in Oregon, serene naturescapes at his Cottonwood, California home and the hovering anxieties of the 2020 lockdown. Padilla first began Discovery of Meaning in Oregon while working at a modular synthesizer shop and learning more about modular techniques—but completed it at his home in California in the middle of the 2020 lockdown.

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2004
The music of GENESIS consists of creation-inspired electronic ambiences that are woven from elements of new synthesis forms as well as vintage analog instrumentation.
The resulting music will please anyone who enjoys electronic music that is timeless and yet current, bold and yet subtle, melodic while remaining ambient. Genesis takes place inside the listener's mind and spirit. If you’re familiar with American ambient classics like Michael Stearn’s Planetary Unfolding or Kevin Braheny’s The Way Home, you'll be familiar with the general territory that Padilla explores on this CD. The tracks are all long explorations of ambient synth textures, with an emphasis on attractive, harmonious sound. The music has a bit of a classic space music feel, and the titles (Genesis, Moon Tides) seem to reflect this. The tracks on Genesis are relatively static, featuring drifting clouds of electronic sound. While the music doesn't take you from point A to point B, it encourages you to take a trip wherever your mind wanders.
The highlight of the CD is Padilla’s sumptuous electronic orchestration. The soundscapes that Padilla creates seem to envelope you, and, while the soundscapes are relatively static, new sounds and textures are continuously emerging that reward active listening.
In addition to the music, the classy packaging for the CD. It features beautiful abstract art that seems perfectly in tune with the music.
 

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2016
This release features beautiful electronic music with celestial sounds drifting across hypnotic syncopated patterns of organic synthesizer sounds.
Currently celebrating his fourteenth year as a prolific solo artist and collaborator on the Spotted Peccary label, Craig Padilla offers up his latest outstanding solo work, Heaven Condensed, where he presents to us a world beyond time and space.
Structured like a four-paneled work of sacred art, Heaven Condensed forges a philosophically spiritual vision of another dimension, abstracting the existence of Heaven as one might experience it either internally or externally, in four diaphanous movements that convey a wide range of organic, tangible, physical energy to amorphous, floating inspiration. Kaleidoscopic in its sequences of melody that meander through complex harmonies and atmospherics reminiscent of classic Berlin School masterpieces by Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream, Heaven Condensed draws from the time-tested studio practice where analog keyboards and modular synthesizers were traditionally recorded in real-time. Padilla decidedly steers his vast array of electronic instruments in an excitingly fresh exploration of the celestial currents that hover and careen past dark abyssal depths. One doesn’t need to be familiar with Padilla’s previous works in order to find this album accessible. The metaphorical relationships he presents through the sensuous medium of electronic textures and sound spaces will feel familiar to the soul. A capacity for delight and the sublime is the only passport one needs to embark on this sonic-space journey, which is brilliantly realized and emotionally satisfying.
 

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2000 / 2021
LTD 50
"PERSPECTIVES ON THE DREAM WORLD" - one hour of incredible berlin-school electronic music created ENTIRELY using analog synthesizers, including the classic ARP 2600 synth! This music is a bold new approach for Padilla, going back to his "roots" of old-school electronica, combining the music style of the late 70's with modern technology. Fans of analog sequencer/space music will REALLY appreciate this CD! (Be sure to wear headphones while listening.)

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2025
Nothing goes over dreamy atmospheres and pulsating sequences like some great guitar work and maybe some drums! His “Solina” recording a year ago rocked Chuck’s world with its overall sound, depth and integrity and so Mike went after him for a release and the OS “ The Pulse of Life” was born. Consisting of 5 tracks of hand and ear played modular sequencer music performed on the Mattson Modular synthesizer, this is the sound of the past mixed with the shadows of the new, all wrapped in analog goodness.

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2024
LTD 50
This album was improvised live using an ARP String-Ensemble SE-IV synth manipulated with Source Audio Lunar and Collider effects pedals, running through a Solid State Logic BiG SiX mixer, with an Elogoxa ElotTronix XL delay / echo plug-in. The result is an ethereal sound with a beautiful vintage analog synthesizer performed in real-time

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 1996
Fans of melodic EM should find plenty to appreciate in this very good offering from American musician Craig Padilla. Starting with the deceptively light and airy 'Angel' , simple bright piano leads dance around light percussion and a bubbly, bouncing bass line. Though it sounds like middle to late eighties period Tangerine Dream, the echoing atmospherics also have strong hints of Patrick O'Hearn. Lest one finds this too lightweight, then check out the amazing Ron Boots impersonation on "Vast Emotions", a 16-minute romp through bright sequences, pounding beats, and a healthy dose of electronics to go with it. Layer upon layer is added, and I'd swear I'm listening to an outtake from Boots "Detachment Of Worldly Affairs" or "Different Stories and Twisted Tales" CD. The similarity is really quite remarkable. After this high dose of energy, "The Gift" gives pause to recover, sounding a bit new age but very nicely arranged. Padilla has very good, tight compositions, as opposed to long improvisations, at least on this CD. "One" begins with birds, then adds long, flowing majestic synths. They build to a crescendo, then level off. The piece has a very symphonic feel, with a sense of grandeur. Midway through, the theme changes, and it ventures back into more electronic territory, with another Boots-like pulsing bass line. Then the majestic theme returns, blending the symphonic and electronic elements very well to finish the piece. A slow, very pretty sequence begins "Night Rain" , with acoustic guitar effectively melded into the mix. The addition of powerful electric guitar by Al Mires gives this track a more pop/rock feel, but it still fits in fine with the rest of the CD. The disc concludes with the 28 ½ minute title track. A beautifully constructed piece, it explores a variety of themes and moods, with excellent sequencing and sounds. It develops slowly at first, then picks up speed with its very strong sequencing, which builds in intensity as layers are added. The energy peaks, and then seems to drop off at just the right time, ending in a wonderful pool of spacey electronic sounds. Despite the obvious influences mentioned, Padilla has fashioned his own sound, adding a great deal of warmth to the skillful sequencing and electronics.

2000. Phil Derby

Here the last Copy!

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2012
Heart Of The Soul is a blend of gentle piano melodies, pulsing analog sequences and the classic synth explorations that have come to define Craig Padilla's releases over the past fifteen years..

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2006
A new, deep-space long-form work from the acclaimed fourteen-year veteran of electronic music! The Light in the Shadow is an electronic/space ambient evolutionary sound environment that is dense and organic in texture, and otherworldly in experience.
A single track features over sixty minutes of continuous music.
The Light In The Shadow has the floating, blissful quality of classic ambient/new age work of early Steve Roach, Michael Stearns or Kevin Braheny. The music bathes you in beautiful sounds, from washes of string-like sounds to long, tones that drift from one speaker to another.
While The Light In The Shadow is primarily a drone-based piece, it evolves significantly through its 1:03 length. At times, Padilla thins the music down to a perfume-like ambience, and at other times he builds densely layered sound collages. The piece also gradually build from a free-flowing beginning to a more rhythmic peak. Padilla adds layers of interlocking sequences that add a sense of motion, without making the music driving.

Padilla’s CD has a seductive sound, but also a depth, so that it rewards various levels of listening. For ambient and space music and Craig Padilla’s The Light In the Shadow is another great release.
 

Artist: Craig Padilla
P: 2002
Padilla's album Vostok is an excellent combination of conceptualization, performance and transformation. At 51 minutes, Vostok is a long-form piece. The meditation begins with some classic white noise. Thefilter slowly sweeps us into the piece and soon low undulating drones are introduced, adding density to the windblown soundscape. The piece fills out with layers of breathy synth pads, resonant filter motion and arcs of meandering melody. From out of this dense interplay, the beginnings of a staggered, somewhat hesitant, pattern emerges. The pulse fills out and we travel along its ever evolving progression; a forward momentum towards the space that Padilla is bringing into our dreams. The cycle of smooth flowingchords and multi-layered rhythms provide the setting, but from here on it is up to the listener to make what they will out of this free musical fantasy. Vostok is an expansive piece. The music and sounds develop at their own pace, drifting in and out of focus according to each listener's disposition. WithVostok, Craig Padilla seeks to realize music that helps us find a way to a serene center in the midst of a perplexing world.
Inspired by the mysterious depths of the hidden lake under Antarctica, Vostok is a haunting voyage into an unknown space filled with wonder and awe. Padilla masterfully crafts a subterranean soundworld, transforming electronic instruments into subtle abstract beauty that feels no less organic than inorganic, in this visionary long-form ambient work. Vostok is a place of purity and stillness, of undisturbed existence.