Underwater

Chronique

Underwater is decent, though not groundbreaking, electronic ambient music that is neither new age nor experimental rock or electronica. It's for people who like new age who are looking for something a little more daring and more disturbing, perhaps, or trance music aficionados who want something that's often placid in its textures, but still challenging. Johnny A. Rodriguez and James Sidlo are the multi-instrumentalists that create most of the soundscapes, with some help from a couple of friends. Rodriguez's synthesizers supply the dense electronic, room-filling eerieness that will probably land this on your noncommercial new age/electronic program. Sidlo's guitars and processing are on the whole more keening and foreboding, displaying an impressive range of dive-bombing and buzzing timbres, at times getting into dark and vaguely apocalyptic territory. Spooky, Gregorian-like deep vocal-electronic effects are skillfully deployed in "I Frequency, Dream in Soundwaves," and Sidlo's guitar takes on an almost desert Southwestern feel (albeit heavily processed) for "Brief Moon."
© Richie Unterberger /TiVo