Album Review: Glider by The Sight Below

The work of an anonymous Seattle-based producer with an evident affinity for the outer realms of shoegaze and somber ambient techno, Glider would have been an equally easy fit on Kranky, like label staple Loscil, or an idealized version of 4AD that has maintained the line running through the darker and spacier aspects of their early catalog. Alternately, this is just as likely to evoke the absorbing gray moods present throughout the Cure's Faith and Seventeen Seconds as thaw-out techno like Yagya's The Rhythm of Snow or Markus Guenter's In Moll. Though heavily processed, caressingly foreboding guitars are a major component of the Sight Below sound, the root is Wolfgang Voigt's Gas releases -- whether or not a muffled thump is present, rhythm is paramount.

Full Review >>

Under Seattle’s largely grey skies, the musician behind the Sight Below challenges the conventions of ambient techno with his guitar. Glider‘s nine songs follow three previously released free ones from the Sight Below, who plies lethargic, long-delayed guitar lines with an ever-so-gentle kick. Glider’ s pattern is immediate: whether it was named after the My Bloody Valentine EP or not (theirs is incidentally louder), these shoegaze-friendly compositions eventually become so serene, they’re almost part of the room.

Full Review >>

The style of ambient techno that Wolfgang Voigt (Gas, Burger/Ink) minted has proved to be massively influential. It gave us the Field, who leans heavily on the techno side of the Gas aesthetic, arranging pithy scraps of musical information into deathless pulsations. It also gives us Seattle's the Sight Below, a mirror image of the Field. Burying the thump and emphasizing the ambiance, Glider could have been marketed as a lost Gas album while raising only the most initiated eyebrows.

Full Review >>