Netherworld – Over The Summit

Netherworld "Over The Summit" CD

Netherworld, the project of Glacial Movements' driving force Alessandro Tedeschi, has returned in January 2011 with his second GM offering entitled "Over The Summit", an album dedicated to Hyperborea, the mythical unspecified territory in the Far North known as a warm and sunny land with the sun shining twenty-four hours a day. The album opens with the title piece, "Over The Summit", which is invaded by minimal, freezing drones with arctic breathings and occasional distant heartbeats perfectly setting the mood and portraying spectacular images of unbounded icy landscapes. Elements of coldness are all over this enormously immersing composition, however the overall feel is mesmerizingly warm and inviting. Grandióso, Alessandro, I am hooked right away!!! Absolutely gorgeous nocturnal sceneries of pristine vast areas with shimmering sky show are magnificently explored through "Aurora Performs Its Last Show". Kind of joyfully droning hymn praising this breathtaking light show, mastefully enriched by glitchy voice transmissions (most likely in Norwegian). Artic dronescapes have never sounded more charming than this, magnífico!!! "Iceblink (Aurora Borealis Mix)" is leaded by looped deep drone winds with distant and tender noise rumblings, all wrapped by filigree subterranean feel. Few sharper sonic buzzes and outbursts and ominously remote voice-like sounds invade here and there. Not only another masterpiece, but certainly a truly transcendental experience!!! "Crystallized Words" are coming out of the foggy glacier's cavern with otherworldly formations of glowing ice crystals and uniquely mysterious ice walls, where deep spiraling drones are interplaying with slowed-down vague beats and whispering voices. "Thoughts Locked In The Ice" are sculpted with more tranquil, but slowly cascading texture featuring also few sounds of wind and more especially fascinating deeply droning sounds, which might be emitted by the expanding and contracting ice. "Iperborea" is wrapped by hiss with more minimal structure, where distant and cavernously echoed heartbeats are joined by icy drones, resonating singing bowls, abyssal noises, ghostly voices or moments of silence. Grand finale at its most mysterious and desolate!!! "Over The Summit" is fascinatingly visualizing, strangely challenging and intensely inviting. Another superb album from Glacial Movements!!!

Richard Gürtler (May 8, 2012, Bratislava, Slovakia)