Bryter Layter Review from Resident Advisor (Ian Maleney)

Joseph Raglani and Mike Pollard are no strangers to the worlds of drone and synthesizer music. Between them they have issued dozens of tapes, CD-Rs and LPs under a host of monikers, many on Pollard’s own Arbor label. Two Lenses is a return to work under the Bryter Layter name first used on 2009’s cassette release Imprinted Season. Developing the themes explored on that earlier tape, the duo take a direct and melodic approach to analogue synthesizer composition without losing any of the cinematic grandeur often associated with the style.

Two Lenses avoids the drone scene tendency towards lengthy durations, instead playing itself out in a series of relatively short bursts of concentrated melody and distinguished timbre. The antecedents are clear, from Brian Eno’s Discrete Music to Popul Vuh’s work with Werner Herzog, but never overbearing. The second track in, “First Light,” exemplifies the approach as a syncopated lead line extends itself over a billowing cloud of polymorphous tones. Counter-melodies emerge softly from the distance, repeating and changing slightly before fading indistinguishably into something new. Nothing is forced; each gradual shift from solitary tone to complex and full depth of field happens naturally, even as the undercurrent layers of sound subconsciously wash from languid note to languid note.

While consonance is of the utmost concern throughout the record, things do take a turn for the noisier in the form of “Aspect.” Here the buzzing of oscillators drifting in and out of feedback provides the bed of sound for distorted, distant melody to drift over. It is far from aggressive but it does hint at the darker edge of the tools being used. In some ways, it’s the only track to really expose the mechanized or unnatural element at the heart of the sound, an important break that stops the album from hazily drifting too far on a kosmische cloud of its own making.

Two Lenses finds strength in restraint. No epic blowouts, no extended passages of fried circuitry and knob strangulation, just an ear for the beautifully melancholic and structures of hidden complexity. Even at its noisiest, everything remains crystal and the discretion used in choosing each element is abundantly clear. Each detail is allowed to be as important as the next, regardless of size, tone or duration. The care and warmth in every sound makes Two Lenses a disarmingly easy listening experience, at once capable of fading modestly into the background or rewarding every ounce of your attention. The choice is yours.