Fog - Thirty-Three Recurring
Fog’s "Thirty-Three Recurring" is a mesmerizing and immersive journey into ambient electronic music. With its intricate textures, captivating soundscapes, and meticulous attention to detail, the album offers a rich and rewarding sonic experience that invites the listeners to get lost in its atmospheric depths. 2023 peaked on May 15th, 2023.
"Tall Shadows of the Wind" (04:30): Opening the album with an atmospheric touch, "Tall Shadows of the Wind" sets a serene and introspective tone. The delicate melodies and ethereal textures create a sense of calmness, drawing the listener into the immersive world of Fog's sound. It introduces the listener to Fog’s signature blend of ethereal melodies, pulsating rhythms, and subtle layers of sound.
"Dancer" (05:08): "Dancer" Delves into deeper and darker territories. The pulsating beats and hypnotic, repetitive synth lines create a captivating groove that gradually builds throughout the track, accentuated by the sounds of coins dropping and industrial elements colliding. It's a mesmerizing piece that showcases Fog's ability to blend ambient textures with subtle electronic elements flawlessly, especially during the quiet, contemplative outro of haunting granulated dog barks and gloomy bells.
"Moire" (06:19): Introduces a more rhythmic element to the album. The track's brooding atmosphere, characterized by a malicious violin and a jazzy clarinet, create a sense of mystery and tension.
"Esther" (06:42): "Esther" takes a more melodic approach, featuring a captivating piano motif that intertwines with delicate ambient textures. While initially sounding a retread of previous ideas, once the keys are introduced it unfolds gradually, allowing the listener to immerse themselves in its introspective and emotive atmosphere. A delightful surprise.
"Happy Ending Problem" (06:52): presents a melancholic and absorbed mood. The haunting melodies, ethereal vocal samples, and intricate percussive elements create a sense of tension in the first half. The track’s midway crescendo is impeccable; its release as satisfying as taking a making dump you’ve been holding in for way too long. The second half of the track is as similarly satisfying, like taking a piss over your shit’s grave.
"A Brief Foray into Contrivance" (01:46): At just under two minutes, this track serves as an interlude, providing a moment of respite and transition between the preceding and following tracks. Despite its brevity, it contains many ideas tightly compartmentalised, and it’s highly impactful, cultivating a sense of danger and lunacy.
"Thirty Three, Recurring" (05:55): "Thirty Three, Recurring" serves as the title track of the album, and it carries a sense of anticipation and mystery. Atmospheric textures and gentle progression create a hypnotic and immersive experience. The repetitive clucking of chickens on any other album would have been humorous, yet here, they’re ominously striking. Perhaps the weakest song on the album, due to its lacklustre percussive elements that sound like they were trying to escalate, yet remain doleful.
"Apothem" (08:35): Incorporates the percussion much more skilfully, The song takes a more expansive approach, allowing the sounds to evolve and unfold gradually. The track builds upon layers of ambient textures and subtle melodies with a menacing saxophone fuelling the nightmare. It showcases Fog's talent for creating intricate soundscapes and demonstrates his ability to captivate the listener over an extended duration.
"Of Collatz" (17:43): Closing the album with an epic-length track, "Of Collatz" offers a deep exploration of atmospheric soundscapes. The extended runtime allows Fog to experiment with different sonic elements, creating a sense of ebb and flow. The track evolves organically, with gentle melodies and intricate layers gradually intertwining to create an immersive and meditative experience. Preceding its grandiose explosion is an already fitting conclusion to the album, perfectly amalgamating all preceding elements with a heightened sense of dysphoria, enhanced by the moodier bass elements and the cryptic, tail end composed of dark strings. The blissful stream of harrowing synths wildly crescendos during the finale moments of the album; it comes out of nowhere, though all is absolved given how impeccable every goddam minute before it was.
In conclusion, "Thirty Three, Recurring" by Fog is an ambient electronic album that excels in creating immersive and introspective sonic landscapes. If Pink Floyd didn’t steal the title, it could have easily been named Dark Side of the Moon, as the album is lunacy at its finest. The production quality is excellent, with each track showcasing a meticulous attention to detail. The sound design is rich and textured, creating a three-dimensional sonic experience that reveals new elements with each listen. The album has a cohesive flow, with each track seamlessly transitioning into the next, enhancing the overall immersive experience. This quality cannot be understated, as the flow is impeccable, and must be heard to understand.
Incredible
Listen to it here:
https://fogsound.bandcamp.com/album/thirty-three-recurring-2
Fog - Thirty-Three Recurring
