Roach, Steve

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 2015
A delayed transmission from 1983: lost tracks representing the two then-emerging sides of Steve's artistic muse.

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 1986 / 2017
Released in 1986, this recording of intricately-woven sequencer lines and buzzing synthesizers established Roach as the American answer to the pioneering European electronic masters of the 70's (Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream). Alternately thrilling and serene (sometimes within the space of the same track), Empetus' waves of energy rest upon labyrinthine patterns of interlocking notes and wildly cascading tonal clusters. Roach varies the moods from piece to piece as well: the bright, piercing electronics of ''Seeking'' contrast vividly with the starker, sweeping veils of sequenced notes and arcing waves of ''Empowerment'', or the turbo-charged synths that rev through ''Conquest''.
It's all riveting, exciting stuff, and although Roach largely abandoned the style as he moved forward, Empetus remains an important, if largely unsung, statement documenting the course of modern American electronic music."

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 1986 / 2008
The rights to Steve's 1986 release Empetus reverted back to him, and this along with some recently discovered "lost pieces" inspired a 2-CD Collectors Edition. The second disc, "The Early Years", features two amazing long-form sequencer pieces circa 1982. The first piece, "Harmonia Mundi" was recorded live in the L.A.-based Timeroom with Swiss-born electronic musician Thomas Ronkin. At 45 minutes, this is one of the more possessed and intense analog sequencer trance pieces you're likely to hear. "Release" is a 24-minute solo statement of emotion and energy connected to the early years of Steve's evolution in sound, harkening to NOW and TRAVELER. By the time Empetus was released, the approach of these longer German School styles were morphing into a new sound heard on Empetus and beyond.
"Empetus is full blown sequencer-based music illustrating a further evolution in the visceral side of Roach's music. Nine precise pieces that still sound fresh today. A favorite of sequencer music lovers. Released in 1986, this recording of intricately-woven sequencer lines and buzzing synthesizers established Roach as the American answer to the pioneering European electronic masters of the '70s (Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream). Alternately thrilling and serene (sometimes within the space of the same track), EMPETUS' waves of energy rest upon labyrinthine patterns of interlocking notes and wildly cascading tonal clusters. Roach varies the moods from piece to piece as well: the bright, piercing electronics of ''Seeking'' contrast vividly with the starker, sweeping veils of sequenced notes and arcing waves of ''Empowerment'' or the turbo-charged synths that rev through ''Conquest''. It's all riveting, exciting stuff, and although Roach largely abandoned the style as he moved forward, EMPETUS remains an important, if largely unsung, statement documenting the course of modern American electronic music."

Artist: Steve Roach 
P: 2015
Mesmerizing soundworlds from an artist immersed in the sensual realms of electronic/ambient sonic creation. Steve Roach dives further into the deep end of introspective music on this atmospheric set. Focusing on the essential elements of sound, silence, tone, and time-altering forms, the four long-form pieces are a lens to view the molecules of emotion and enhanced perception. Peeling away the surface layers to reveal the subterranean strata beneath, ETHERIC IMPRINTS brings into form a contained sense of stillness and reflection. Reaching towards a new voice in Roach's vocabulary of expressing the ineffable, the twenty-eight-minute title track was created with a highly processed electric grand piano as the main voice. Performing in real time and responding to an expansive electro-acoustic environment, Roach profoundly shapes and molds musical space and tone in his hands. In this piece, moments of stillness arise like waves of flow and ebb while a substratum of analog modular synth zones provides a constant, slowly shifting undercurrent of mystery and harmonic interplay. The ethereal, ghost-like forms of the cover art perfectly capture the subtle sense of expanded body-spirit awareness the music evokes. Meditations upon Tuyen Q. Nguyen's artwork during the creative process helped inspire a new pathway into places beyond THE DELICATE FOREVER, Steve's previous atmospheric release. ETHERIC IMPRINTS evokes an aural phenomena that seems to float and hover, expanding and dissipating before our very ears. A kind of Rorschach test for the auditory senses that can offer a different imprint at every listen; what we bring to it completes the experience. This music -- like the artist himself -- lives in the center of a soundworld that knows no boundaries. Best described as "elegant minimalism," ETHERIC IMPRINTS offers a deeper listening into the nuance of now by way of the power of sound.

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 2016
A dark-ambient magma flow of ultra deep harmonic immersion. This is the next chapter in the evolution of Steve's rapturous long-form zone-worlds. Moving beyond the drone form, FADE TO GRAY is a consciousness-activating, 74-minute space of slowly churning, shifting harmonic alchemy. Subterranean sonics emerge rich with visual correlations, deep below the Earth's surface, monitored and amplified into an above-ground listening space. Steve approached FADE TO GRAY as if working on a large scale canvas or as a sculptor, shaping etheric material into sonic form through the tactile process offered by his analog hardware-based studio. Beyond the immersive environment experience, the music also functions on several levels. At low volume and infinite playback, FADE TO GRAY is highly effective for hypnogogic travel and sleep. At a higher volume, on a sound system that supports the emotional impact of full resolution playback, the sensation of a surreal, symphonic movement is magnified, expressing texture, mood, and emotion at a cellular level.

Artist: Steve Roach, Patrick O'Hearn & Byron Metcalf
P: 2004    
Within the opening moments of FEVER DREAMS' first track, "Wicked Dream" featuring Patrick O'Hearn on bass, it is clear that a new chapter is opening on Steve Roach's long and winding pursuit of potent soundworlds far off the traveled path.
The music's foundation is built upon long mid-tempo hybrid grooves with strong bass elements created from a combination of acoustic and electronic means.
Steve Roach's atmospheric and loop-spun melodic guitar textures rise and fall, intermix with his synth and computer alchemy to create an aura of complex emotional import. The overall feeling of FEVER DREAMS is one shrouded in an exotic amber-colored light filtering through an overgrown mental landscape of last night's lingering FEVER DREAMS; the sensual atmosphere is especially present on the 30 minute track "Tantra Mantra" featuring percussionist Byron Metcalf.
This release of floating, hypnotic groove meditations sets the course on a new direction presented over the three interconnected "Fever releases" planned throughout 2004.
Steve Roach - synthesizers
Patrick O'Hearn - bass
Byron Metcalf - percussion

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 2004    
The second in the three part Fever Dreams series involves many of the same musicians as Mantram – Metcalf on frame drums and percussion on most tracks, and Seelig plays flute on the busy “Energy Well”. Vocalist Jennifer Grais joins Roach and Metcalf on about half the pieces, bringing her floating ethereal voicing and cosmic chants into the mix of floating synths, didgeridoo, shifting sound worlds and textures.
Unlike Mantram, however, Holding The Space is a more varied program that ratchets up the tribal rhythmic intensity in some parts, at other times relaxes out into pure floating cosmic drones (as on opener “The Wounded Healer” and “Opening The Space”); the somewhat varied approach from track to track underscores the variation as well, and most pieces fade to black between, making each a standalone entity. The sidelong closer “Holding The Space” brings all the elements together into a gentle trance-like cosmic drift, worth the price of admission by itself. With this second offering in the Fever Dreams trilogy, Roach goes deep into the collective primitive psyche--perhaps as deep as he's ever gone--conjuring a thick, lush, intricate weave of tribal, holotropic grooves wrapped around Byron Metcalf's relentlessly perfect shamanic percussion and spiked with hauntingly keening vocals from Jennifer Grais. As this 72-minute story unfolds, Fever Dreams II guides the listener through some of the most vivid, affecting sound worlds Roach has ever created. Fever Dreams II jumps back and forth between powerfully beat-driven sound worlds and more flow oriented grooves. "Fires Burning" might have been designed to let your heart rate slow back down. The drums slow as dark, lush tendrils of sound--Roach's "nomadic grooves"--rise softly upward.

Artist: Steve Roach
P: 2013
Future Flows is the second part in a triptych that kicked-off with Soul Tones at the end of 2012. If you´re looking for any significant change in sound or direction, Roach´s Future Flows won’t bring any of that. Still, the surge into deep and immersive sound worlds continues and seems what this recording is all about. From the first track on, the long form soundscapes (according Steve’s site they were all created from a palette of hand-crafted timbres and techniques) spread a nice tension through the ebbs and flows going on in the various layered, non-rhythmic textures. The outcome offers various symphonic/ethereal flavors, revisiting sonic territory investigated on e.g. Back to Life and the massive Mystic Chords and Sacred Spaces, but also the extensive journey undertaken on the older album Ascension of Shadows with kindred spirit vidnaObmana. This slow-flow mood and at times even meditative music has a nice touch and soft glow, creating an overall contemplative sonic aura for 70 minutes.
As a side-note, I imagine Future Flows - and other of his recent albums - clearly illustrate Mr. Roach’s full awareness the clock of life is ticking and hitting him (and us) faster and faster as we grow older. -Bert Strolenberg

Artist: Steve Roach 
P: 2012  
This release reveals an entrancing facet within Steve's evolving Immersion series. With the first four Immersion releases focusing on harmonic meditations and glacial forms, IMMERSION FIVE - CIRCADIAN RHYTHMS began the introduction of movement into the series. GROOVE IMMERSION massages the senses by finding the ultra sweet-spot blending of "infinite" grooves and mercurial soundworlds, holding this space for the course of 70 minutes. A fasinating sense of the present moment constantly updates itself with micro shifts inside mandala-like rhythms. At times, an almost weightless sense of being becomes another part of this of mind-altering GROOVE IMMERSION experience.

Artist: Steve Roach 
P: 2011
The Immersion series takes a compelling turn, moving towards a new perspective on Steve's Immersion experience. Disc one, "Circadian Rhythms" explores a sensual flow of harmonic suspension and sparse melodic mantra-like patterns hovering over rhythmic spaces and mercurial zones. Opening up within an organic analog modular garden of sound, a pulsing undulating groove spiral emerges, creating a suspended sensation of constant flow while hovering in the now. "Circadian Rhythms" moves through a continuous 73-minute flow in three phases.
Disc two, "Shroud of Night" was created from a blend of Steve's unique textural electric guitar and harmonic synth alchemy. The strands of emotion contained within this long-form atmosphere take on a feeling of clouds illuminated by full moonlight wafting into the deep hours of the night. This is a place of pure immersion and sonic warmth. Tested on infinite-repeat mode for over a year throughout all times of the day, into the night and beyond. Immerse thyself, once again.