Max Corbacho is back again with a beautiful ambient album that express a deep sense of connection and unity.

Try to breath the gentle sounds floating in the air as if your lungs have thousands of little ears. Allow this fresh energy to enter into your body and mind and keep the stream. Soon the music takes you out of your bonderies, in the luminous space, where is no day, nor night, no form, nor colour.Follow the great breath, step into the temple of dissolution and surrender to the Pure Being. BreathStream album invites us to embrace Immanence and Transcendence, the fullness and the void and to discover a deeper reality through a sublime musical experience that will leave you breathless.

I really like the direction Max Corbacho has taken with his most recent releases, The Talisman and now BreathStream. He seems to be delving deeper and deeper into pure floating music – no rhythm or melody at all, just serene calm tones that thoroughly soothe and placate. BreathStream is a particularly focused work on the art of diffuse sound, as contrary as that may seem. Track titles are very appropriate; “Act of Light” has a shimmer and sheen to it; “The Great Breath” seems to echo into infinity. Perhaps the most delicate and subtle of the lot is “No Day nor Night.” The beauty is in the way Corbacho makes something special out of next-to-nothingness. The challenge is for me as a reviewer describing this minimal musical excellence. Suffice to say if you enjoy ambient music as a means of escape or relaxation, look no further than BreathStream.

© 2008 Phil Derby / Electroambient Space

Expansive, drifting ambient zones – beatless, minimal. The series of compositions on Breath Stream are smooth, flowing sonic states that fade seamlessly one into another creating an unbroken listening experience. Airy drones and steady velvet washes gently rise and fall in graceful slow motion, the sound thickening into harmonious even tone in places, then dispersing into almost atonal enormity. At times the intensity of the music drops down low as if the listener were increasingly isolated, distant, remote – or perhaps simply more profoundly at rest, wholly immersed and almost motionless. Beguiling effects burble or flutter on the peripheries, little motes and flickers some barely perceived, sonic breezes drifting through the aural space.

MOOD

The most pervasive mood here is one of almost blissful submission – a captivating serenity imbued with a sense of enveloping immensity. The track titles effectively draw together strands of galactic isolation and deeply personal inner experience – The Great Breath, This Luminous Space, No Day nor Night, Pure Being. Max’s music suggests the tranquil euphoria of being suspended weightless among morphing luminous nebulae, warm clouds of shifting colour, beautiful dreams and faintly recalled memories.

ARTWORK

The Breath Stream jewelcase is a deep, dark spacey blue package. Initially the main image appears as a view of infinite space – closer inspection reveals a horizon, one bright spiralling arm laid out like a flat plain stretching away into the distance. Above starlike clusters form further spirals, spirals of spirals – clusters of imaginary galaxies. Similar visuals fill the rear cover – an unobtrusive tracklist hanging in the upper left quadrant – times alongside. The two panel insert opens to display a closer view of the front cover image – here focussed on the foreground – a little like a glass bottomed boat to the universe. Information is minimal – credits to the left a quote from Vietnamese Monk Thich Nhat Hanh to the right – «Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts.»

OVERALL

Breath Stream builds upon the solid foundation laid down by Max Corbacho’s previous release The Talisman. Coming now as the eighth release from this rising Spanish ambient star – the new album exhibits a formidable depth of sound unveiled with masterful restraint. Much of the music arose from long improvisational sessions utilising Max’s collection of hardware synths, catching those moments of magic – selecting and arranging the most absorbing passages into unbroken flow. The album is to be the first of a series of digital releases, offering downloads at iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody, eMusic and Napster, among others, and, also, full CD quality downloads through the well respected new download platform www.musiczeit.com. Catch some samples at the Musiczeit page.

WHO WILL LIKE THIS ALBUM

If you enjoyed The Talisman then Breath Stream will take you further into the rapture and beauty of Max’s enormous musical space. This is a release for fans of warm, inviting, minimal ambience with the soft sonic density of Thom Brennan, Numina and Steve Roach. No beats – just infinite space – effulgent, dark, rich in colour, perpetually black.