Talvihorros - Descent Into Delta

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5...according to our Phil on Tue 13 Sep, 2011.

I like this guy. He's only been doing stuff for a few years but his first few releases really impressed me. I was looking forward to this baby and it doesn't disappoint! Again I'm gonna use the word soundscapes...actually fuck it...this guy creates beautiful dreamscapes! Ben (Chatwin) produces beautiful sounding music with his guitar and nothing else. There's a hefty dose of post rock in there and sometimes it sounds like the bits in Godspeed records before everything kicks in and goes large. That doesn't mean to say this doesn't go large...I don't even know what that means but this certainly has epic qualities which surpass what most post rockers can do. The track 'Theta' reminds me a bit of David Sylvian & Holger Czukay's tape loop/radio fun experiment 'Plight & Premonition'. It's beautifully warm sounding and it totally sucks you into this gorgeous world of floaty time. If you've not heard this guy before and you're into post rock/ambient/droney business then check this out cos it's seriously good.

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A year passes by and finally Talvihorros is back with his latest album Descent Into Delta to be released on both vinyl and CD. The man behind this one man guitar driven excursion is London based Ben Chatwin who in addition to hibernate has had material released through Benbecula, My Dance The Skull and our sister label Rural Colours. Despite only recently forming the Talvihorros project in 2008, Chatwin has been experimenting with sound ever since he first picked up a guitar as a teenager. His live performances have seen him share a stage with the likes of Tim Hecker, Stephan Mathieu and Ian Hawgood to name just a few. Chatwin has to this point juggled live performances and studio work as two separate entities with studio material being culled from sounds derived from as many different instruments as possible and live performances being restricted to just guitar and pedals.

Descent Into Delta marks the blurring of the lines which separate these two disciplines. It was live performance that ignited the production of this record, which began life as a series of live improvisations, these were then selected and edited over a long period of time. During the mixing process the concept to Descent Into Delta was born and it slowly developed through many hours of editing and arrangement. Chatwin became interested in different states of mind, realising it actually produces frequencies or waves - much like sound, itself. When the mind is alert, awake or anxious, these waves are Gamma, at the other extreme, during deep sleep, Delta waves are produced. It was in turn Chatwin's intention that the sounds of Descent Into Delta would loosely depict a journey from Gamma through to Delta, as a kind of experiment to see whether the listener could be subconsciously encouraged to trace this path through sound.

Towards the last few moments of the album on the last track 'Delta', Chatwin was joined by viola player Anais Lalange who added a subtle but effective impact to the closing stages of this record. The addition of this instrument brings a whole new dimension and texture to the guitar explorations of Talvihorros.

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