Terra Incognita: Ambient Works 1975 - Present

From the mid-70's onwards Boyd Rice, a disenchanted young American was busily making records in limited numbers, purely for himself. Experimenting with the misuse of instruments, domestic appliances, records and record players he was effectively carving out his own niche in the history of music, becoming NON and garnering a formidable reputation as "The King of Noise."

"Terra Incognita: Ambient Works 1975-Present" is a retrospective compilation containing a selection of strangely serene minimalist and ambient works culled from Rice's miscellaneous and mischievous output from 1975 to the present. For Mr. Rice, whose real and alleged offences read like a litany of the woes of the 20th century, an album of new-agey "mood music" seems oddly out of whack with the notorious image he has cultivated. But time and again, Boyd has defied and redefined expectations, confounding even the legions of misanthropes that adore him. Taking its starting point in 1975 with material recorded under Rice's name (the remainder of the album is recorded under Non), the most shocking aspect of "Terra Incognita" is how deliciously listenable and enchanting it is. Whether the chiming harmonies of "Solitude" (from 1999's "Receive the Flame"), the sumptuous desolation of "Arka," and unearthly ululations of "The Fountain of Fortune" (off 2002's "Children of the Black Sun"), or the lush romanticism of "Cruenta Voluptas" (1987's "Blood & Flame"), the un-easy listening aspect of Boyd Rice's music, which tends to be overlooked in the range of his works, is herein quite palatably and comprehensively presented.