Alio Doe

Electronic legends and like-minded drone masters Alio Die (born Stefano Musso) and Mathias Grassow conspired to create one of 2003's finest ambient releases. Expanding Horizons, a double-CD set, features deep drones, smooth samples, gentle rhythms, and subtle melodies. Die recorded his basic tracks in '99. Grassow added his touches and arranged and mixed the final master in '01 and '02. Klaus Wiese (singing bowls, zither, Indian strings) and Carsten Agthe (percussion) added their expertise as well. So, these discs feature three of the greatest drone artists ever - Grassow, Die and Wiese. Agthe has recorded with Grassow and Wiese frequently. His deft touch and sense of timing compliment the organic textures and dark timbres smoothly. Deep listeners will fall into the catacombs created by this outstanding conglomeration of electronic talent…

"Raw" and "honest" tend to be vastly overused words when it comes to rock music of any stripe, but they may just apply to John Doe's solo debut on the DGC label (spun off from Geffen). In some respects, this was always something of a trademark with Doe's former band, X, but there was always the whirlwind of Exene Cervenka carrying most of the weight of the vocals, and the frontline immediate image, while Doe was always just slightly back in the shadows, seemingly as anonymous as his name…

Eleusian Lullaby is a sensual ethereal-ambient collaboration between Italian soundsculptor Stefano Musso (aka Alio Die) and Italian singer Martina Galvagni. It is the third release in Projekt’s series of Alio Die’s vocal collaborations following 2001′s Apsaras (with Amelia Cuni) and 2005′s Mei-Jyu (with Jack or Jive).
Eleusian Lullaby blends the natural, warm and earthy ambient compositions of Alio Die with the elegant, neo-classical voice of Martina, merging notes and silence into an expanded dreamscape. This is lullaby music like an aural caress from darkness into the light. The combination of the vocal melodies with the abstract qualities of the loops and instruments creates a suspended near-dream space, intimate and sensual at the same time…

Tempus Rei is further evidence that the ambient artist known as Alio Die is in fact the reincarnation of a very old soul, probably from the High Middle Ages dovetailing into the Renaissance. The matter-of-fact list of devices used to make this extraordinary album - "drones and loops, zither and field recordings" - reveals nothing about the depth and mystery of the two, half-hour long pieces.Stating however as the artist does that it was "celebrated", rather than created, speaks volumes. The entire album is redolent of old, musty wooden beams and fusty, book-lined rooms, as entire collections of ancient instruments appear to have been sampled and woven into this irresistibly captivating tapestry. As an added temporal twist, the entire recording features its own,discreet background track of rainy, current-day street sounds, tires whishing by on wet pavement, a heavy, gusting wind casting raindrops at the window.
One of the most understated and yet most powerful of Alio Die´s many unforgettable works.

Alio Die knows the sound and this album is an acoustic cathedral, but it could also be the sound of an ancient forest or what is more pure has survived or escaped the implacable vortices of space-time. A pure, charming, superlative album, where Alio Die opens passages, planing, flying through. There is no uncertainty, no swelling, no cracking, the sounds emerge, appear and disappear within a solid soundtrack. Thanks to such dilated sounds the listener sees in the distance. It looks like through a crystal sphere, the trained ear reads messages that Alio Die has received from other worlds thanks to an accustomed sensitivity now capturing in every sound event the sacred and essential.

Crossing styles and boundaries, Holographic Codex is a mixture of atmospheric ambience, IDM sequences and psybient textures; these cult Italian musicians create a blending of ritualistic soundscapes and technogenic landscapes. Alio Die has over 60 releases, some on America’s Projekt Records and others on his own Hic Sunt Leones label. Montana recorded 5 collaborations with Pete Namlook on Pete’s German FAX label, plus released 10 solo albums with various European imprints. On their first collaboration, Alio Die & Lorenzo Montanà create transporting and alluring aural sceneries of evolving, intimate sounds…

The music spawns between two long suites, "Sine Tempore" and "Aura Seminalis", evocative soundscapes which, in comparison to Stefano's huge previous discography, reveal a rather new approach: the sound is, indeed, still cosmic and ethereal, yet already in the second track some inserts of Gregorian-like chants appear on the sceen, boosting the general aura of holiness and trascendence. The spirit of the German cosmic couriers still flows among Alio Die's drones, recalling memories of Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra, but without any nostalgic or retro feeling, just showing how to blend the musical and cultural past into new forms of great charm. It's almost a close encounter of kosmische musik and Renaissance scores…

Elusive Metaphor is the second collaboration between ambient master Alio Die and scapes creator Parallel Worlds. In this album, the drones and loops by Alio Die are combined with the modular soundscapes of Parallel Worlds, resulting in out of this world aural environments that merge elements of a dreamy and calm nature with mechanic and even industrial musical paths. Zither and field recordings are combined with soundscapes and sonic fragments that defy boundaries, giving the listener a unique mental journey of unspoken beauty.