Release data:

Robert Rich & Alio Die – Fissures
CD, Hearts of Space/Fathom, 1997

The sonic content captured on “Fissures” is a doorway to an inner world filled with mesmerizing, at times even dreamful textural soundscapes and acoustic instruments pictured before an overall melancholic backdrop dressed with intriguing samples and many nice, intense “perceptual cracks”.

On “Fissures”, Stefano Musso (aka Alio Die) and ambient-gulp expert Robert Rich meet as kindred spirits, both immersing in a similar deep introspective direction for 60 minutes in one continuous go, disclosing the magic of the present moment in multi-layered feelings of a simple complexity and harmony.

Note the moody organic and mysterious edge found on each of the seven darker-shades, highly atmospheric tracks as it journeys through subterranean and microcosmic natural innerscapes. I for one think full immersion is encountered on the hypnotizing and haunting 8-minute “The Divine Radiance of Invertebrates” and the 18-minute “The Road to Wirikuta”, both evoking profound feelings of awe and wonder.
Sensing the subtle trail of tension embedded in the ambient drones is almost like smelling moist humus and vegetation as one breathes the living air of the microcosmic world envisioned.

All in all, the emotive “Fissures” makes great ambient music with a dash of tribal, featuring a beautiful interplay of light and shadow executed in an astonishing, quite mind-blowing manner.

You can see what reviews I have done of these artists on the Robert Rich, Alio Die artist pages