ALBUM REVIEWS

Biosphere
Cirque
Touch
@www.vanguard-online.co.uk

 Picture this: The Big Chill Festival, summer 2000. Set in the idyllic nether regions of Wiltshire. Peacocks preening in the languid sunshine and a mass of revellers lounge in a dance tent while ambient meisters Biosphere play dance music like you've never quite heard it before. Are you getting a feel for the kind of cine-sonic ambience that is Biosphere? No? Well imagine this: the chill out room at a Megadog event with the percussion slowed down by at least 40 bpm; now inject a serious amount of glacial electronica and there you have it. Slow, trancy, oceanic chill-out music. 'Cirque' is even more chilled than Biosphere's previous long player 'Microgravity'. This owes a lot to that fact that Geir Jenssen, the man behind it all, lives a hermit existence in the Artic region of Tromso, Norway. Biosphere's new long player is chilled to the point of frost-bite yet there's an underlying grace and beauty in their distinctly Artic sound. Warning, though, if you invest in this record don't wake up to it first thing in the morning as you're liable to be tranced out for the foreseeable. Recommended dosage: 60 mins to be taken late at night, after a party, with spliff and acid in copious amounts.

Paul Whitson