Review Summary: words cannot describe the awesomeness of this album, but here comes a pile of words.
To explain the appeal of this ambient/drone album, I must describe incredibly specific, and well-suited visuals, so close your eyes. Yes, close them. Just kidding, you can’t read this review if your eyes are closed (you moron). Let us continue.
Imagine that you find yourself in an infinite room that feels both familiar and unfamiliar. Imagine the room to be your favorite color, with the shine of dazzling lasers. You are alone in this room, alone until you hear the sound of a train in the distance. This is no ordinary train. It does not run on tracks, yet the sounds that it makes suggests that it does. This train seems to run on music itself, or at least the embodiment of it. It is akin to the THX sound effect if it was multiplied 2000 times. It permeates every fabric of your being, and every inch of the room. If it was possible to capture the feeling of having celestial sex and morph it into music,
Tardigrade would be the result. The album is chillingly beautiful. It is the feeling of sliding down infinite water slides, through vast, impossibly stunning ice caves, while somehow staying toasty warm. Thankfully, the music lasts an entire 32:44, ensuring this experience’s longevity. It would be a better idea, though, to loop it infinitely, and then listen to it for the rest of your life. I am exaggerating, of course, but now you understand the scope of the album’s impressiveness.
There is only one little problem with the album – it is mind-numbingly repetitive. The music is indeed a spectacular auditory spectacle, but it is too long. As much as I love it, when I stopped listening to it, my ears wouldn’t stop ringing. The music sounds best when left to simmer in the background of every day activities, or while sleeping, for it leaves something for the imagination to process, and elaborate on. However, although
Tardigrade may lack variation, it is still completely enjoyable, and certainly engrossing. I can’t remember the last time I listened to the entirety of a song as long as this, because I get bored easily. Rest assured, my dear readers, that this album is not boring. “Heavenly” might be a more fitting word.
