Getting Closer is the debut release from UK-based ambient artist David Lancaster, who unveils his Warmth Terminal project with a collection of four melodic and accessible drone-based compositions, mastered by Ian Hawgood. Avoiding the customary sense of stasis hanging over these sorts of releases, Lancaster launches with 'On That Day', a quarter-hour work that swells through bright, sustaining passages of tonality whilst evolving through an unexpectedly tuneful, somehow aquatic sounding progression. On this opener, the presence of synth-string chords and a guiding bass presence sets Lancaster's sound apart from the dominant "micro" tendencies of the ambient genre. Serving up a shorter second piece, 'They Sat Down And Sighed Happily' (try to ignore the cloyingly twee title) is full of glowing major-key harmonics and a continuous field recording of what seems to be rainfall. It's all very pretty and highly musical, once again readily coming forward with a sense of melodic development nestled away at the heart of the drone. 'It's All Around Us' takes these notions of subtle, tuneful motions to a new extreme, installing a sense of time-lapse euphoria that probably has as much in common with a Robin Guthrie production as it does electronic drone music. Finally, 'See In Slow Motion' rounds off the album in similar style, drifting through nine minutes of icy, hypnotic waves. Limited to 200 copies.
I can't imagine a weekend more suited to acquiring a Warmth Terminal, since the snow has settled it's been so cold I can see my own breath inside the house. It's the time of year to get wrapped up and sit by the fire with a good book, or take long soaks in warm baths (assuming your boiler is up to it). David Lancasters invitingly named Warmth Terminal are a perfect accompaniment to such efforts to keep the cold out. Clean and warm drones as we've come to expect from the delightful Hibernate label, four tracks that wrap you up like cotton wool. One of my favourites on the label so far.
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