Nightmare Ending
Nightmare Ending is the first proper Eluvium album released since 2010's Similes, the unexpectedly vocal-heavy ambient-pop record that simultaneously delighted and confounded longtime fans. But the Nightmare Ending story actually began years earlier, as it was intended to be the follow-up to the watershed album, Copia. Conceived as a way of helping loosen his self-imposed ideals of perfection, Cooper labeled each Nightmare Ending track as either a "dream," or an "imperfection" – a way of differentiating the philosophical concept of "dream vs. reality," couched in the more tangible technical distinctions of "flawless vs. flawed." With each progressive listen those differences naturally challenged themselves, and without relying on the standardized perfection protocol, Cooper became increasingly reluctant to release any of it. He shelved it, and pursued Similes instead. But Nightmare Ending wouldn't go away; it lingered in the back of his mind, the abandoned fruits of a truly worthwhile and noble journey towards a less creatively constraining mindset. Cooper returned to it with renewed vigor, writing and recording in a blur of time that spanned several years. The result is a body of work that encompasses everything remarkable about past Eluvium albums, executed more powerfully and poignant than ever before.
Eluvium's commanding new double LP was supposed to be the immediate successor to the drone artist's 2007 album Copia. Although there's been five years of mixed successes in between, it's Copia's contemporary at least in terms of quality, providing an alternately delicate and deluging take on Matthew Cooper's penchant for elegant piano and dreamy electronics.
Eluvium - Nightmare Ending review: Matthew Cooper the man, finally meeting Eluvium the artist.