Entry 306 - Dive Reflex Service - 01

 

There is ambient, there is dark ambient, and then there is other things within the ambient genre that are a bit off. Albums that hit different than their contemporaries. Dive Reflex Service's debut album is one of those albums.

This album is the audio equivalent of driving through incredibly dense fog on in the dead of night, not knowing where you are going outside of a vague notion of where you need to be. The music is so mysterious and so obtuse that much of this is more of a notion of what music could be, but only for about a third of the album is there anything musical about it.

When I listen to Dive Reflex Service I'm not looking for a hook, or really anything to draw me in. Instead it's one of those albums you let wash over you and get swept away in. When the vocals come in, what are they trying to communicate? Who is this woman speaking to me? When the music does show up, why are these melodies so hard to follow? Why is it so hard to make out the details of what's happening? So many questions and no answers are provided.

01 is an album I keep coming back to because of all those questions. I don't ever expect an answer, but that's not the point. The mystery is the point. The intrigue that the album provides is the point. The fact that I'm still trying to wrap my head around this album after listening to it for dozens of times is absolutely the point.

I love music like this and it's a shame that I don't know more bands that evoke this feeling, this very well could be some of my favorite ambient in my collection.