Morning One reviews:

- The Assistant
- Broken Face
- Delusions of Adequacy
- Diskant
- Fake Jazz
- Rockerilla

From The Assistant:

With the second Aarktica release, dronemeister Jon DeRosa ups the ante for like-minded acts by increasing the complexity and the surface tension without succumbing to aural clutter or bravado. Detailed and precise, each gesture (crisp glockenspiel; histrionic, heartbreaking voice-over, slow-creeping glacial guitar) assumes a weighty dignity and dramatic resonance too often absent in such minimalist fare. Though brimming with pathos and despair, Morning One is transcendent. Those who fail to succumb to its great beauty have hearts of stone if, indeed, they possess hearts at all. - Martin Lombardy

From Broken Face:

Morning One is the follow-up to the huge critical success (at least here at the Broken Face Headquarters) of Aarktica's debut album No Solace No Sleep. Even though this mini CD surely is another trance-inducing floater, Jon DeRosa at least at times chooses to move away from the glacial velocity of his earlier work towards a more shoegaze-pop sort of sound. This is especially evident in the lush opener "These Days Fail To Bring Me Near," which also sees DeRosa using vocals, something that he, taking such poetic lyrics and his dark vulnerable voice in mind, should do more regularly. The graceful piano notes against distant guitar washes and sampled voices of "[Less Than or Equal to] 23" makes it sound like a live broadcast from a spaceship disappearing into the endless depths of the ocean right after a disastrous take-off. The sense of sudden and unexpected grief continues in the title track which closes this 22 minute long disc with ambient guitar drones. The music seems to be carrying heavy burdens of tension on its shoulders which prevents the outcome from sounding clinical, instead reaching for the heart more than the brain.

From Delusions of Adequacy:

"These Days Fail to Bring Me Near" starts off, and it's an absolutely gorgeous song. Very quiet, the basic elements are DeRosa's hushed voice, some lightly strummed acoustic guitar, and then those washes of sound, creating a wall of ambiance that blankets the whole aural soundscape of the track. It's as if you took your favorite slow-core song and wrapped it in a tight, warm blanket of sound. The addition of vocals to the style is quite good, and I'm constantly amazed by the beauty of this song with every listen.

Although I'm not often a fan of more ambient, atmospheric music, anything done with originality and talent will sit well with me. DeRosa takes a unique approach to his electronic project, managing to mingle the enveloping ambient background with piano, tape, and guitar -- and even vocals -- to create something that ends up sounding quite powerful and adventurous. - Jeff Marsh

From Diskant:

Starting at the top, the gold medal, bottle of champagne, scantily clad girl and place atop the winner's rostrum goes to an EP called Morning One by a gentleman going under the assumed name of Aarktica (Ochre Records). The lead track of the three, 'These Days Fail To Bring Me Near', is the most involving piece of new music I've heard this year. It's basically five minutes of ambient washes of noise, vocals you can barely make out and a really simple picked guitar part. And that's it. The most pretentious thing about the EP is that it's themed around soundtracking the moment when you wake up in the morning with your arms around someone you love (your mum doesn't count) for the first time. Which would make me laugh in its face, apart from the fact that Jon only goes and pulls it off. The other two tracks (predictably) don't rise to the same heights, but this has the first choice of biscuit from the Tesco Finest selection simply because I want 'These Days Fail To Bring Me Near' to be the last song I hear before I die, it's that good. – Stuart Fowkes

From Fakejazz:

Jon DeRosa runs the one man show that is Aarktica. His sonic explorations were triggered by a sudden loss of hearing in one of his ears and was originally a project to create sounds for the listener that approximated his experience with muffled, mono hearing. This short 3 song EP follows Aarktica's debut, No Solace in Sleep, an ambient album of gorgeous drone. Morning One is relatively straightforward, particularly the first track, "These Days Fail to Bring Me Near" which is a pop song of the shoegaze-ish breed. Aarktica's first foray into vocals make this song the most straight-ahead song he's done yet. "[Less Than or Equal To] 23" is driven by a simple piano line, which feels very similar to some of Mogwai's even tempo, docile songs. Lastly, "Morning One" finishes up the EP. It's washed out ambience directed by repetitive ebowed guitar drones wanders, allowing the song to lull the listener completely and end the EP on a beautifully melancholy note. - Dick Baldwin

From Rockerilla:

Esta sincero entusiasmo anche l'uscita degli Aarktica, detentori di un suono post-rock forse non del tutto inedito, e nondimeno di una grazia sublime. Il successore di No Solace in Sleep e una collezione di tre brani che segnano un parziale timbri ben piu temperati ed organici. Un arpeggio di chitarra celestiale impone un'atmosfera aerea e rilassata alla dolcissima "These Days Fail to Bring Me Near," il piano elettrico ed il glockenspiel collocano il post-ambient moderatamente elettronico di "< 23" all'interno della scuola Labradford, i loops di "Morning One" ne proiettano le angeliche visioni orchestrali al di la della Discreet Music di Eno. - Enrico Ramunni

Back to press
Home