Jerome Faria – Overlapse
Jerome has been a friend of mine for over 10 years now. We shared a passion for the demoscene and the experimental ambient side of the music world. Both of us experienced an isolated growth as early music artists fiddling with experimental sounds in our own corners of Portugal, where the experimental music scene is not that vast. I could even call it elitist.
In the early days of the millenium me and Jerome used to have online chats about idm, drone, noise, both of us discovering glitch music as a genre. His public debut in 2004, was actually released right here on Enough Records, titled offear.ep. We ended trading our latest original mp3s and remixing each other for a few online releases, demo soundtracks and split editions.
Through his work on the Hyphema DVD he managed to get his work recognized and played in a some of the few Portuguese festivals dedicated to experimental electronics, including the reknown Madeira DIG where he played alongside names like Taylor Deupree, Tim Hecker, Deaf Center, Alva Noto, Murcof and Fennesz. His sound bares some resemblance with all of them.
In 2012 Jerome releases now again through Enough Records his 5th album, Overlapse. Also available through his own label Broqn as a deluxe edition.
Born from max/msp patch experiments, this album is 48 minutes of slow paced textures reminiscing of the ocean, the clouds, day dreaming at the top of a cliff, sleeping on a meadow. Each track is filled with vague melodies, careful revolving textures, slow breathing pads. An ethereal memory with a positive light. You can’t call it drone or microsound exactly, but the sounds do derive some thoughts from those two genres. What you can call it is cinematic ambient music. It makes you relax, drift, travel, dream.
All of the tracks use slightly different elements in their composition but share the same minimalistic progression narrative. Attack (Prelude) has a slow rise of intensity, with soft noise tones and small glitches pulling you up. Sustain I falls to chime bells and small glitches. Sustain II seems to explore tape loops and field recordings. Decay I brings you to a deep well of sea forms and sounds. Decay III explores the usage of guitar strings and morse signal tones. Release (Conclusion) is the only track with the sounds of an organ.
The album feels very cohesive, well produced and carefully mastered. A great release for Enough and another testament of Jerome’s continuous progress as a sound artist exploring the experimental ambient genre.