Release data:

Steve Roach – Back to Life
CD/DIGITAL DOWNLOAD, Projekt, 2011/2012

The double album “Back to Life”, presented in a beautiful designed 6-panel digipak, is a culmination of sonic events adressing a fantastic range of ambient landscapes and forms.

Again hitting the 70-minute duration on both discs, Steve’s in-depth spherical creations bring a sense of magic and comfort, but they are also recycling light, shadows along many elements known from his previous releases. It’s still smooth pulsating and highly minimal soundscaping with a excellent spacious sound design along a magical veil draped over it.

On the other hand, “Back to Life” also left me with the feeling if things have significantly evolved in a satisfactory manner: almost all featured music of the seven tracks on disc 1 realm heavily in “Mystic Chords” territory (a release that dates back to 2003).
The exception on this is the “Fever Dreams”-ish “Tranquility Base” with its slightly tribal pulses, beats and gentle e-guitar waverings.

Disc two presents the lenghty “Mist of Perception”, where the arc of immersive music offers better dynamic undercurrents and intensity culminating in a nice assortment of cosmic, otherworldly and in-depth textural landscapes that work well in infinite playback mode.

Due to the previously mentioned reasons, “Back to Life” in my opinion is not an essential recording in the Roach-discography of vast, mythic and imaginative soundscapes.

Although the album was already digitally released at the end of 2011, the physical release is due for April 10, 2012.

Website: www.steveroach.com

You can see what reviews I have done of this artist on the Steve Roach artist page