Following the jazzy library vibes of 2023’s collaborative ‘Dolphin’ LP with Greg Foat and Moses Boyd, the venetian maestro Gigi Masin returns to the ambience for which he is renowned, with ‘Movement’ – his first solo full-length since 2020’s ‘Calypso.’
The album’s title has a double meaning; the first of which reflects on Masin’s place within the pantheon of ambient greats, his ongoing artistic ambitions, and his aspirations for a scene which he’s seen grow exponentially from humble beginnings. “Slow ambient isn’t for me anymore, so I strived to create a new form. The possibilities are endless, and I want to try and drive things forward,” he comments. “When I started making music, no one cared, but now the genre has become a big movement. I’m excited by what others do, and I want to learn from the young. We’re all part of something.”
The LP is also an ode to literal movement, both in nature, and in human physical expressions to sound. “I wanted to make ambient music for movement. Not ‘dance music’ in the standard sense, but dynamic music, with a beating heart full of love, for communal experience, for dancing, and for romance,” states Gigi. “I wanted to move ambient away from solitary listening and cold academia. I want something outwards, not inwards. Something somatic that connects with the body, and not just the mind.”
Effectively a lifetime in gestation, Gigi recalls a formative experience watching birds soar atop his childhood home. “I was completely fascinated by their movement – flying in long circles or swooping at extreme speed, sewing a fine fabric in the air,” he recalls. “The swallows have always made me think of our lives, moving in populations that barely touch each other and rarely connect, like a dance that never ends in an embrace. And that’s why I’ve always associated composing with the sea; for that continuous and infinite flux of approaching and moving away, which makes it elusive, and difficult to understand.”
Portraying the ocean in all its glistening, undulating, light-refracting majesty, Gigi captures perpetually shifting hues of green, blue, grey, and white. More than that though, he uses the ocean as a metaphor for the incomprehensible and changeable depths of human emotion. Evoking the dark and unknowable gargantuan abyss beneath the surface, an unplaceable ether often engulfs the listener, suspending them in strange primordial atmospheres that blend tenderness, melancholy, reverie, and unease all at once.
‘Bed on Mars’ sets the titular tone for Masin’s renewed curiosity, with cosmic atmospherics evoking the sensation of waking up on a new planet unafraid, whilst the poignant synthesized trumpet and suspended liminal limbo of ‘Lost’ feels like floating adrift in an unknown sea.
As someone whose work has been sampled by Björk, Post Malone and many others, Masin knows more about ‘The Age Of Sampling’ than most. A haunted, clanging rhythm underpins unknown voices from decades old radio, captured on tape in eternal hauntological purgatory.
Morphing and dynamic, the delightfully pleasant ‘Movement’ flows from booming electro drums into dusky deep house, all adorned with heavenly pads, disembodied vocals and soaring faux brass.
Born from a love of Japan, the gentle jazz piano of ‘UMI’ is a fond recollection of sitting on a beach marveling at the Pacific, whilst the bright beaming light of ‘Golden’ radiates warmth, sounding like the bossa nova brother of Göttsching’s Balearic classic ‘E2 E4’.
Delving further into off-centre beats is the celestial techno funk of ‘Deception Dance’, which sounds like Sun Electric jamming with Carl Craig and Kraftwerk, and was dubbed “dance music from another planet” by one of Gigi’s twin sons.
Doffing his cap to a huge influence is ‘Azimuth (John Taylor)’ – a stunning cover version of the ECM-signed British jazzers eponymous track. “They’ve always been an inspiration to me; I listen to their playing and my body understands,” Gigi comments, before proudly adding that “I performed as a trio with John Taylor and Kenny Wheeler when touring my album Wind.”
Final track ‘Fifteen’ is a classic Masinian soundscape of drones, pads, and synthetic instruments, which unfurls calmly in gentle beatific bliss, concluding proceedings in reassuring style, bidding a warm farewell, and wishing for peace.
Gigi Masin ‘Movement’
Album released 29th May
LP/Digital
Tracklisting:
1. ‘Bed on Mars’
2. ‘Lost’
3. ‘The Age Of Sampling’
4. ‘Movement’
5. ‘UMI’
6. ‘Golden’
7. ‘Deception Dance’
8. ‘Azimuth (John Taylor)’
9. ‘Fifteen’
Photo credit Silvia Gin
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