Four new recordings from Russia, Ukraine, and Lithuania are dedicated to the appeal of absence. Being somewhere - anywhere! - else is an alluring alternative to local reality.
The importance of folkloric narratives and a premodern ethos endure for some Russian and Estonian performers. In each case, the allure of yesterday is imagined as some vaguely perceived source of light.
A recording from Leonid Fedorov and Vladimir Volkov examines how St. Petersburg's cityscape changes over time. The baroque trajectories of music outdo the linear passage of urban "progress."
Various freedoms, both social and emotional, are pondered in some new electronic recordings from Russia. As the pressures upon liberty increase, one of the artists coins the generic tag "drowntempo."
The Belarusian electro-folk ensemble Rusya is publishing some reconsiderations of pagan song in a modern setting. That same yearning for some lost fruitfulness appears in very different places.
Five performers from Russia and Ukraine consider the link between one's physical surroundings and notions of risk. A home environment determines one's view of whatever lies outside.
The Siberian webzine Big Echo has begun to publish a series of monthly compilation albums. Although these intriguing tracks are, in essence, homeless products of the internet, local history continues to matter.
Various thematic emphases cause four new recordings to opt for an understated hush. The passage of time, noisy modernity, and other problems make quietness both wiser and more appealing.
Teapression Waves is a young and promising electronic label, using a host of generic tags to define its gloomy output. Those same categorizations, however, are not employed in standard western ways.
Echochorus, a one-man project from Riga, has published a new soundtrack to the 1924 silent feature, "Aelita." Some core concerns from that recording emerge in other locations, far from the Baltic Sea.
