Acre: Isolationist
Isounderscore

Packaged in a fluorescent orange matte jacket that's as blinding as its musical content, Isolationist is the first official full-length from Acre (Portland-based Aaron Davis). The disc pairs a new piece recorded during summer 2009 with two remastered tracks that previously appeared on his Painless CD-R issued on the Students of Decay label in 2008. In essence, what we've got here are three untitled exercises in drone minimalism ranging in duration from thirteen to twenty-two minutes. The tracks' generous length, high volume, pulsating electronic undulations, and immolating slow-burn naturally exerts an hypnotic pull on the listener. In intensifying its shuddering revereberations ever so incrementally and by escalating the volume in equally controlled manner, the longest track perhaps burrows deepest into the primordial fire. Even so, all fifty minutes of the recording's synthetic whirlpools are capable of inducing maximum psychtropic impact. Acre's Isolationist should appeal to fans of the psychedelic drone work of White Rainbow (Adam Forkner, also a Portland resident ) and Greg Davis.

February 2010