Alec Empire - Low On Ice (The Iceland Sessions)

This must be one of the most unique pieces of electronic music that I have in my collection. It’s the type of music where you can’t put any label on. I’ve heard a lot of music in my life and as an ambient adept I’ve experienced lots of music that crosses all boundaries of the musical spectrum but this album is really something special, to say the least. The title fits perfectly with the music as this is cold, very cold. It’s really astonishing that it creates such a unique and overwhelming atmosphere with such a little amount of sounds. Most of the tracks have beats, very slow beats that are woven into wonderful and strange soundscapes that sound like ice sculptures.

Another aspect of this album is that most of the tracks have a lot of reverb and are extremely lo-fi. This combination sucks you into a spiral of ice cold shivers and indefinable places. If you play this album on the right time, at the right place and last but not least: on a good sound system (so you can play the low-fi beats properly) this music works like heroin. Totally mesmerizing and unique in every possible way. Alec Empire created a masterpiece here, and it’s not his only one…

I ordered this disc to a friend of mine who went to Zurich but when I ordered I was full on raviing with hard trance and gabba and I was expecting this name Alec Empire from this storm of rave release but when the disc is arrived it took time to get used to it. But after years I realised that it's not only 180 or more bpms but also ambient reality.
This album is from beginning to the end cold! really cold. And the dub makes this so deep too. I remember after years Alec Empire made a speech when mentioning this album that: You feel like in a deep hole on ice and when you look up to the sky from the hole you start freezing slowly... That is the best explanation for that album.
I simplyfy as dub meet cold and experimentalism of Alec Empire!

A timeless classic! Morbid like a heroin drug movie soundtrack and deep like the icewalls of iceland! Some tracks (20(1), 20(2)) seems to only consist of reverbed soundscape while others (low on ice) require a decent subwoofer turned up to loud to fully enjoy those low frequencies.