No Solace in Sleep reviews:
- Alternate Music Press
- Aural Innovations #15
- Autoreverse
- Broken Face
- Delusions of Adequacy
- Dream Magazine #2
- Gothic Preservation Society
- Houston Press
- Opus
- Outburn Magazine
- Starvox
- Vendetta Magazine

From Alternative Music Press:

No Solace in Sleep is a somber dreamscape where sound becomes music & music becomes sound. Minimalist ambient guitar structures, utilizing treated guitar tones varying from freight trains to falling snow emerge from the shadows projecting a range of mood, being and emotion. In this dark musical terrain, Jon rolls out a remarkable new map, the kind used by adventurous travellers to move across stricken borders, through unusual terrain and down lost highways. It is a work of unresolved tension, astonishing harmonies and timbres, and spooky moments of forlorn beauty. –Ben Kettlewell

From Aural Innovations #15:

Aarktica is a solo project of Jon DeRosa who combines guitars and electronics to create haunting ambient/drone soundscapes. Ambient/drone is a good description for Aarktica's music. The drone is present in the form of stretched out singular themes that pulsate deep in your chest, but are tamed and made quite beautiful by the ambient elements. As you might expect, the music develops very slowly, but subtle changes arrive frequently resulting in music that travels down a linear though varying path. Imagine being in an empty, acoustically perfect concert hall, with only a piano on the stage, its strings being raked lightly and lovingly to produce atmospheric meditative space drones. - Jerry Kranitz

From Autoreverse:

A beautifully packaged CD from Silber Records. The name and song titles; "you have cured a million ghosts from roaming free in my head", "glacia", "I remember life above the surface" and others remind me of Biosphere, and after putting it on, the 13 minute ambient guitar track that leads off the disc put me in the mind of same...in fact i think they've logged more hours with the album "substrata" than i have. You could pick an infinite number of worse bands to sound like. Another reference point could be Tear Ceremony. What we're talking about is intelligent lo-fi guitar ambience with a predilection for melodious, melancholy repeating phrases, meant to tug at those resonant heartstrings with autumnal buzzes and minor chords. Even if it takes some fucking with the equalizer to make it sound right. - c. reider

From Bleeding Minds:

This debut album from Jon DeRosa is simply beautiful. A captivating musical experience that is a story without words, yet completely within the realm of human understanding. No Solace in Sleep made my whole body chill as if it had just been dipped into fresh snow. But the chill it delivers is more comforting than anything. The music locks you in a trance that can only be comprehendable through direct experience. There is a rare beauty delivered with this cd...a striking combination of mystery and familarity. I can honestly say this release sent a shiver straight through my heart. Although I'm not usually a big fan of experimental music, No Solace in Sleep managed to generate a feeling of serenity inside of me that no other performer ever has.

From The Broken Face:

Guitarist Jon De Rosa's previous recordings with NYC chamber pop group Flare, indie folk ensemble Dead Leaves Rising and his high school goth/folk/acoustic solo material as Fade left me ill-prepared for the ambient, droney, cinematic soundscapes of his latest sonic explorations as Aarktica. In 1998, Jon started this project "as an experiment in sound to recreate and convey the tones heard through one deaf ear." Originally nothing more than "tape-hiss lullabies lacking structure composed through a blur of painkillers and insomnia on a 4-track cassette recorder," Aarktica graduated to these multi-layered, effects-laden, post-Eno ambient guitar suites in a little less than a year! Imagine a greatest hits mix tape consisting of the best of Windy & Carl, Stars of the Lid, Labradford and early Azusa Plane and you're on the right track. And while De Rosa has said, "there's a certain charm to the spontaneity of drone music," he was quick to add, "I also find that that can take away from its overall credibility." This release is his attempt at marrying the two approaches. "While recording the album, I actually spent days mapping out many pieces, notating them and treating each piece like I would a string quartet." Let's examine the results of that endeavor.

A few minutes into the opener, "Glacia" and you may find yourself adjusting the volume to find out whether you've just purchased a blank CD! Whispering waves of sonic molasses drip out of your speakers as De Rosa replicates the ambience of an iceberg floating through the midnight Atlantic: dark, cold and immense. "Indie" has nothing to do with a subgenre of music and everything to do with pain, although the two are often indistinguishable these days! The far off sound of a beating (ear)drum (his own?) places us squarely in his world of frustration with the inability to clearly "hear" the sounds of civilization around him. This sense of swimming in quicksand coupled with the sonic interpretation of the "sounds in his head" continues through most f the record and is emphasized in titles like "You Have Cured A Million Ghosts from Roaming in My Head," "The Ice (Feels Three Feet Thick Between Us)" and "I Remember Life Above the Surface." The seemingly pretentious titles can be overlooked as one is enveloped in the sheer expanse of the sonic sensual overload. The aural equivalent of syrup dripping down a "short stack" is interrupted by the Nick Drake-ish "Welcome Home." Fittingly, it seems to be a self-directed imperative and is the lone track with a clearly identifiable guitar.

De Rosa has escaped from his "fantastic voyage" through his inner ear, but I, for one, was glad to be along for the ride. You will be, too. - Jeff Penczak

From Delusions of Adequacy:

I've always been intrigued by the concept of dying in the cold. Perhaps since reading To Light a Fire in grade school, the intricacies of being so cold that your body literally stops moving, internally and externally, has fascinated me. They say it's like going to sleep, calm and peaceful, and the cold goes away. Not that I ever intend to try it, but I've wondered what those last moments feel like, when you no longer worry about finding warmth and embrace the cold. Aarktica sounds like the soundtrack to that experience.

No Solace in Sleep is a very light wash of sound, slowly waxing and waning, a sort of subtle sonic wave that moves about as fast as a glacier. Rather than coldness, this sound, this experimental noise, seems to exude warmth and comfort. Very light guitar and drums can be heard on "Indie," which takes on a much more melodious structure. There's a much more orchestrated and subtly melancholy sound to "Elena," while "You Have Cured a Million Ghosts From Roaming in My Head" takes on a less ambient feel, even leaning a bit toward the softer side of a band like Mogwai. "Inebria" picks up where "Glacia" leaves off, having a white noise effect for another 10 minutes. "Welcome Home" has a melodic Tristeza-esque feel to it, a nicely flowing instrumental that puts more focus on the guitars. And the closer, "I Remember Life Above the Surface," finishes like the album started, only this song makes me feel cold and lonely, a bitterly chilling sonic wash of sound.

Kurt Ralske, mastermind behind the band Ultra Vivid Scene, recorded an album entitled Kyrie Eleison that consisted entirely of soft, comforting drones of sound completely created on a computer. It had the feel of a comforting wash of soft noise, as does Aarktica. But while Ralske was turning away from conventional instrumentation, DeRosa uses guitars to create his noises. Hints of low, moaning strings can be heard now and then, as can the light almost tinkle of bells, the subtle strum of a guitar and the distant echo of a drum... This is what I would want to hear while relinquishing those last moments of life to sleep. - Jeff Marsh

From Dream Magazine #2:

A solo sound identity for Jon DeRosa of NYC bands Flare and the Dead Leaves Rising. Aarktica sounds like distance and vast spaciousness. Life processes, tides, frost, clouds, seasonal changes, the arc of night and day, all the planetary pulses played out in the slow motion of real time. Cycling coolly haunting melodic drones, running like a catalog of celestial memories, spilling out days, years, centuries of time. At times as songlike as a sedated Durutti Column, or as ectoplasmic as Flying Saucer Attack sleepwalking through Windy & Carl’s home movies of their trip to Iceland. I’ve listened to this at least a hundred times, and it’s still letting parts of itself rise to the surface, or emerge from the mystery. Ghost songs, old highways empty whispering to itself before the first snow starts to swirl like ashes in the unsettled air, a science fiction soundtrack that turns into a vision of the afterlife, or what the moon sounds like wheeling high in a wide open sky. - George Parsons

From The Gothic Preservation Society:

Listening to these shimmering night-ocean songs of perception slowed nearly to a stop melted that world-self barrier to a point I'd never reached before. Both grandiose and dissolute, No Solace in Sleep is what it might be like to dance with a hungry ghost of the Bardo Thodol just as it began to realize that being all might be preferable to being a frustrated fragment. There's an unspeakable tenderness to this ponderously gentle music, like the sea who lets the sailor live just because it can. Softly ringing, echoing rhythms seem almost buried under the shifting ultramarine layers until you realize that the full ambience is no more than the dance of the individual themes. "Rapture of the deep," the divers call it. Now I can say I've been there. - Columbine

From The Houston Press:

Jon DeRosa, the force behind Aarktica, creates soundscapes that evoke images of the frozen north: eerie stillness, the swirl of wind (listen to "Inebria") or pulsating waves upon ice. It's a meditative drone, the low rumbles of the earth. At its best, drone celebrates inventiveness: The clicking sounds on "Indie" mimic the rotation of a vinyl record. On the other hand, drone often fades to ennui with repetition and loops, but Aarktica simply arouses a centered peace. The music is quiet and slow, almost ambient. In this context, no vocals are needed. - Sande Chen

From Opus Zine:

Consider the vastness of Aarktica's sounds which conjure up everything from distant Arctic wildernesses and brilliant auroras to the deepest ocean depths, and straight on out to the interstellar voids. It's just a little bit ironic that these pieces had their start as the result of Jon DeRosa's deafness. One might imagine that would limit musical output, or at least hinder it, but DeRosa's work proves otherwise. This particular result, No Solace In Sleep, depicts a fascinating, sometimes beautiful, sometimes frighteningly intense world of sound.

Some may lump No Solace In Sleep in with other drone projects, a la Windy & Carl, Bowery Electric, Amp, etc. But "drone" doesn't feel quite right, as it implies something static and uninteresting. Although the sound palette that DeRosa employs throughout No Solace In Sleep is pretty sparse (and make no mistake, a great deal of it is composed of heavily treated guitar tones), there's a surprising warmth and attention to detail there as well.

"Glacia" lives up its name, suggesting a somnambulistic journey across some frozen land north of the Arctic Circle. The intent is similar to that of Windy & Carl’s Antarctica album, but the results here have far more depth. "Indie" adds some slight glitch and a distant piano, while "You Have Cured A Million Ghosts From Roaming In My Head" finds gentle bell-like tones spiraling throughout the icy guitar shimmerings. And the sounds on "The Ice" hint at some icebound choir, or the winter wind playing tricks on your mind, making you hear ghostly voices where there are none.

The album culminates with the imposing "I Remember Life Above The Surface.” Here, DeRosa's guitar becomes intimidating. Huge metallic shards of sound are sent scudding across the surface, only to distort and disintegrate before sinking into the blue-green depths. Soon, the listener is sinking too, diving deeper and deeper down into the abyss as all manner of distorted rumblings surround them. There's a tangible anxiety in this place, a world of sound that most don't willingly venture into.

It's an intense experience, and not one you'll soon forget. And like everything else on this album, it goes a long ways towards shattering any notions you might have of "drone" music. - Jason Morehead, 4/20/2002

From Outburn Magazine:

With the name Aarktica, the disc's cold blue cover art, and song titles such as "The Ice (Feels Three Feet Thick Between Us)" and "Glacia," certain expectations were hard to avoid. Given these frigid clues, however, I was surprised at how calm and soothing I found most of the music.

Aarktica is the solo experiment of Jon DeRosa, whose previous musical experience lies in folky, pop terrain. Permanently deaf in one ear and drugged up on painkillers due to another illness, he started the project in the winter of 1998 as a way to distract himself and kill time, and before long it evolved into the rich, vibrant atmospheres of No Solace in Sleep. There have always been musicians willing to push the electric guitar into unconventional terrain, and with this release Aarktica succeeds at accomplishing just that. Whereas many drone artists rely purely on intuition and spontaneity, DeRosa actually mapped out and notated many of these pieces as though they were string quartets. The intricate blending of notes and processed melodies creates a tight, focused sound, though the relaxed, casual flow of the music belies this precise method of writing.

From stark, insular ambient that fulfills my icy expectations, to the warm, resonating chords of the gently strummed "Welcome Home," this is a fully realized debut that demands a good pair of headphones from start to finish. - Ben Didier

From Starvox:

I quite like this. Granted, most of what I write lately is reviews of ethereal, trancey, and relaxing noise music, but maybe there's a reason for that. The level of quality of the music on this disc makes it difficult to believe that Aarktica began as a hobby. The project was started in 1998 as a way for Jon De Rosa to occupy his time after suffering a tragic loss of hearing in one ear. The fact that the music quickly became of great importance is evident within this album -- there is great importance placed upon the feeling and emotion within. The music is floating and beautiful, solemn yet uplifting, everything great ethereal should be.

The music seems to lend itself to the name of the band, as it has a very arctic feel to it. Cold, muted sounds, droning harmonics, and quiet subtlties all conjure images of snow-covered landscapes. The soundscapes on this disc make great relaxation material. They're deeply contemplative and spiritual -- a journey through a cold realm of sound. - Edwin Somnambulist

From Vendetta Magazine:

Fans of Flying Saucer Attack's more atmospheric side or some of the artists on space rock/experimental labels such as Burnt Hair and Ochre will find much to like about Aarktica, the solo project of The Dead Leaves Rising frontman Jon DeRosa. No Solace in Sleep is full of fascinating and intricate instrumental passages -- including the occasional dark undercurrent -- that will keep you full engaged for the album's hour-long duration (for full dreamlike effect, I recommend headphones or listening to the CD late at night). - Ben Vendetta

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