Dots

First time vinyl (2LP) pressing of Atom Heart’s 1994 ambient album as Dots, originally released by his mighty Rather Interesting label and now newly prepped by Uwe Schmidt himself and cut by Noel Summerville for Astral Industries. Modestly self-described by Schmidt aka Dots as “elevator music”, the project’s only release is defined by its spacious parameters and paucity of palette, using icy arps and plangent bleeps to connote a wide, free-floating sense of vastness and airy detachment. If it is “elevator music”, then it’s surely made for a glass-bottomed lift to the moon and beyond.   Trailing in the shimmering wake of Astral Industries' reissues by Sonmi451, Chi Factory and Heavenly Music Corporation, ‘Dots’ sweetly follows suit with an assurance of no sharp edges or snagging tones for the ardent psychonaut or ambient explorer, working in a very ‘90s way where a utopian trust was implied between artist and listener that says, “we’ve got you” in the come-down session, or when used as an aid for sleeping or for simply escaping your own mind.   To be fair, there was a long period (that only ended during this decade) when ambient music of this ilk was viewed as a bit lukewarm or toothless. But there’s certainly been a sea change in tastes that have lead to folk prizing the potential for this kind of background or environmental music to induce visions of lost halcyons, or perhaps even subliminally gird themselves and become familiar with an early form of cybernetic intelligence, before it becomes overly familiar with us. If, like many sets of ears, you’re exhausted with reissued new age and kosmiche records, but still favour a pre or early-internet electronic soul, this album will push all the right buttons.