Feedback Pieces is the fifth Ian Vine album covered by yours truly in three years. This fact alone will give a clear indication to the hardcore readers. In case of further doubt, we’ll quickly add a pre-analysis sentence: it is the best.
As someone knows, a sagacious application of harmonic resonance – especially in contexts where that harmony is not exactly delineated by precise sequences – works wonders on an open-channeled type of being. Vine’s modus operandi throughout the last releases has implied two things. First, no recorded material gets ever wasted; second, from apparently secondary substances a masterpiece can be produced. This time, the resplendent tracks on offer derive from heavily processed parts and sonic remnants of the preceding Copies I-V. This audible ecology is not “merely” serviceable for new compositions; it also reshapes the listener’s entire system of rules, allowing the kind of fine tuning of our receptive equipment that can exclusively be achieved via a meticulous juxtaposition of motionlessness and fluorescent upper partials.
This music – in particular the 21+ minutes of “Feedback Piece I”, comparable to the finest mesmeric minimalism from any era – projects cosmic vastness with enlightened modesty, its character defined by a quasi-static perfection that is just asking to relinquish any defensive mechanism. Absolute silence is mandatory; no human presence should affect your focus. From there, the evolution of the vibratory continuum is going to do the rest, once again without the need of anything else, much less verbal “explanations”.
Vine is obviously in possession of an intuitive command of the fundamental principle of eternity, not graspable by weakened brains still referring to a “beginning” while trying to get to grips with the temporal limitation attesting their egotistic insignificance. In other words, the psychic decentralization caused by physical phenomena expressing a fragment of endlessness is too intimidating for people needing gratifying news on starting guns maneuvered by invisible men and fantasizing about “next chances” to swipe the dust of irresponsible actions under the carpet of today’s revolting mediocrity.
There are no answers; not in the commonly intended sense. The message itself is, essentially, the response: purely acoustic, immeasurably blissful if only one stops thinking. If this is not reachable by pseudo science’s illiterate gibberish, it is nobody’s fault.
MASSIMO RICCI. TOUCHING EXTREMES. 