Beams From A Spiritual Panorama

"Slow burning vocal loops and drone manipulations, scoping internal panoramas of brooding raincloud tones, coruscating half-lit amplifier worship and midnight devotionals, recalling traces of everyone from Loren Conners to Barn Owl”. Boomkat "...There's more than enough here for even the most irony-poisoned, "woo woo" averse, experimental music enthusiast to latch onto, but open yourself up to it, and who knows? Personally, I've found it a deeply centering addition to my music library." The Quietus As Golden Ratio Frequencies slips into 2020, we are pleased to announce our first release of the year with AHRKH ‘Beams From a Spiritual Panorama’. AHRKH is the solo project of A P Macarte, multi-instrumentalist member of Salford's critically acclaimed noise experimentalists GNOD. Using Modular synthesiser, field recordings and voice, often performing live with video, light manipulation and visual collaborators, AHRKH explores the relationship between sound and consciousness , and it's ability to invoke altered states that touch the intangible within us, offering an opportunity to transcend our present reality. In his own words, Macarte defines that the goal of his music is to “traverse the infinite expansive internal panorama within ourselves and discover ultra-dimensional transportation methods via sound". Primarily a live performance project performing in the UK, Europe and USA, alongside luminaries, and peers alike, in recent times AHRKH/Macarte has been expanding his sonic scope into the Therapeutic realms of sound, studying and graduating as a fully trained and qualified Sound Therapist Practitioner at the British Academy of Sound Therapy (BAST), one of the most highly regarding and prestigious institutions in the field. Combing his contemporary electronic tools alongside traditional intuitive instruments such as Gongs and Singing Bowls, AHRKH has lent his sounds to installation works, Yoga classes, live film soundtracks, sleep concerts, meditation sessions and other such immersive sound experiences. ‘Beams From a Spiritual Panorama’ is the inaugural release from Macarte’s vast private archive, the first solo material to be released since 2015 and is also the first of his music be issued on Golden Ratio Frequencies, the label he founded in 2017 growing naturally from his monthly NTS radio show as a label/holistic sound facilitator, providing a platform for music, art and aural ephemera of a “Vibratory” quality. Highly informed by his own personal spiritual practice (having been a long time Vedic Meditator), Vedic philosophy and explorations in sound as a healing tool, Beams From A Spiritual Panorama presents two long form exercises in psychic entrainment. Recorded in 2015 and named in reference to Meher Baba, an Indian spiritual master who for 44 years until his death in 1969 maintained a devout silence, communicating only by means of gestures or on an alphabet board, the 60 minutes of ‘Beams From a Spiritual Panorama’, aims to both chronicle this devout inner world via an immersive journey into Vangelian synth euphoria, third eye opening throat singing and miasmic drone mantras which swell within touching distance of full blown noise, whilst also serving to begin a series of archival documentation of evolution in sound ; having at the time of recording been newly ushered into the universe of Modular synthesis under the guidance of contemporary, friend and inspiration, Robert AA Lowe. Captured live at Melisa Auf Der Maur's Basilica Hudson art space in upstate New York, the 30 minute unfurling opener, ‘Pralaya’, a sanskrit term for “complete merging and dissolution of the world”, mirrors Meher Baba’s ascent into devotional silence with Macarte transitioning from overtone vocal loops to Modular Synthesiser in the latter half of the performance. Beginning with layered voices, reminiscent of David Hyke’s Harmonic Choir, that spread like heavy incense, the mantra develops into a charged state of attainment as pulsing, luminous synths hum with a blurring vitality. On ‘Paramita”, again a sanskrit term, meaning “Crossing to the further shore, entering Nirvana”, Macarte takes a more experimental approach to rhythm and sonic texture, bathing in a heavily raga influenced melody which gradually climbs into a mind clearing finish, scorched synths soaring in a blistering finale. Far from naïve early wonderings, this time capsule of Macarte’s first forays into the world of vibratory synthesiser sonics shows a patience and intuitiveness informed by his daily Vedic Meditation Practice. Not just a window into the early creative processes, ‘Beams From a Spiritual Panorama’ is, like all deep listening music, a functional record that offers the listener a space of cleansing and wonderment. Physical Copies come on professionally dubbed C60 Cassette tape with on body print, double sided full colour two-page inlay and silk screen Golden Spiral acetate. Pre Order Feb / Releases 6th March 2020 credits released March 6, 2020