Tycho is best described as an excellent copycat of Boards of Canada. This artist uses similar instruments, cd structure (breaking up a beat-oriented track with a short ambient interlude), child vocals in the background, etc etc. Surely there's nothing wrong with following in the same footsteps of greater artists when done right, as Tycho certainly has. Or at least, as he did in his prior album.

In 2004 Tycho released Sunrise Projector.... which is the exact same album as Past is Prologue except for 15 minutes! This is absolutely disguisting to see an artist change the playlist, throw in a few crappy remixes, and rebox an old album labelled as something new. While we might expect this with more popular music, I'd like to think electronic musicians hold themselves to a higher standard. Because this album is little more than a commercialized version of a prior album, I am forced to give it my lowest rating (while Sunrise Projector received my highest). Shame on Merck for printing this mislabelled product.

If you have to choose between the two, the few differences in the Sunrise Projector cd are better than the small changes here. Don't be fooled into purchasing both!

Here we have a fairly standard psychill compilation. The genre has taken a hit much like its uncle, psytrance, in recent years by becoming formulaic and it shows a litte with Chillcode's latest. For fans of the Waveform label and the like, Light Aromas does take a step back toward earlier dub sounds with tracks from Enterprise, Kuba, and a few others. Unfortunately, several tracks aren't particularly compelling. I skip right past tracks 2-4. The good news is that there are some real gems in here. The first track by Enterprise is truly phenomenal: entrancing basslines, floating piano... this is what psychill is all about. The Ten Madison tracks are enjoyable as usual, as is Vibrasphere's latest. The album finishes off with a nice downtempo sound from Saafi Brothers which has a fun late 90's feel to it. All in all, a worthwhile compilation but probably not one to convert critics of the genre.

I wish to correct the numerous reviews here that make this release out to be far more dark than it really is. With the exception of track 6, there is no dark ambient present on this album. The music certainly cannot be described as uplifting, but it is more neutral or melancholy then anything else (I presume others simply have not heard any darker music by which to make a proper comparison).

Don't pass this one by because of the other dark reviews. This is very rich and rewarding introspective ambient music. Perfect for late nights, it can easily lead to a deep and calm slumber including the two tracks involving hypnotic bass lines. This is an album meant not to explore the dark side, but rather to disclose a neutral space, an existence without subject - Blanchot's il y a or Heidegger's es gibt. Let this surreal album wash through you and wash you away. Experience a neutrality (rather than blackness) in your stead.

The less active a music, the more impressive it is when it has to be described as invigorating and full of vim. Wind and Water achieves this dichotomy, and does so amidst a time inundated with experimental soundscape that fails to compel and IDM that has become all-too formulaic. Enter Loess with their own unique take on ambient and IDM genres to create a piece that is simultaneously melancholy and uplifting, active and pensive, harmonious and discordant, organic and quantized. It creates a scape not of land, but of time. This album creates not an idyllic image of a phlegmatic Sunday afternoon, but rather transforms the listener into an eternal observer watching aeons of time fly past; the listener compelled to watch the coming and going of seasons, the growth and flagging of foliation, the rise and fall of mountains. From there, it is up to the observer to determine what it all means.