Rockets, Unto the Edges of Edges

This is the second full-length release for UK-based Robin Rimbaud aka Scanner on BineMusic. In his most intimate and forceful recording in years, Scanner maneuvers across fresh terrain that embraces the traditional - guitar, vocals and string arrangements, and the more eclectic - hundreds of found voices, radar transmissions and environmental recordings. Opening the album with "Sans Soleil" featuring Michael Gira (Swans, Angels of Light) on guitar, Scanner sings for the first time on his album, his voice hovering through a barren landscape of fragile loops and harmonies. Crisp, distressed melodies with crushingly fat beats unite on "Pietas Ilulia" to map a cinematic landscape populated by N.E.R.D. by way of Robert Fripp and John Barry. "Anna Livia Plurabelle" paints an achingly melancholic picture through which celebrated Mumbai-born soprano Patricia Rozario soars and flies with radiant timbre.

By far his most mature and personally somber album, Rockets is in equal parts sumptuous and achingly beautiful, sentimental and exploratory. Jean Baudrillard once depicted paradise as mournful, a fitting location for this ravishing soundtrack.