Review Summary: Certified Present-day Meditation Experience?
I will first like to admit; I am someone who struggles with sleeping. I can barely ever convince myself to go to bed early, or be able to force myself to sleep, without being distracted by something. In order to resolve this, I have sometimes taken on the usage of meditation music in order to calm my nerves and help me sleep; and it works like a dream for the most part. And I’m evidently not alone in my choice to do this, because, frankly, meditation music is everywhere these days; you can literally search “meditation music” and you’ll be hit with a 24 hour video loop of it. So, of course, when I heard that even Alanis Morissette was coming out with a meditation album,
The Storm Before The Calm, you bet I was there to see how the album would work out. To hear Morissette putting her musical foot in the meditation game immediately sounds alarming to those who know her for her rock music output and songs like “Ironic” and “You Oughta Know''; but when you think about it a bit more, you can draw the lines together… was this album going to be the spiritual successor (sic) to Morissette’s 1998 album
Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, with its ambient, electronic and spaced out sound? Well… the answer is both yes and no.
Musically,
The Storm Before The Calm takes that timbre and mulit-facated/nuanced sound that
Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie executed en masse, and completely blows it to its highest possible extremes at the lowest possible levels in terms of timbre. Since the album is supposed to be meditation music, there’s only so much timbre and power than can be directly put into the music; but instead of the music being sparse, Morissette finds the beauty between compromise and instead we are provided with an album full of atmospheric nuance, in size and in details.
The Storm Before The Calm uses heavy electronics, synths, and reverb to act as a solid foundation, which gives the music the space to add depth in terms of little glitchy programming, light swinging overhead feedback and muted percussion; above that, we are supplied with a variety of organic instruments such as piano, string and wind instruments; and finally topped off with Alanis herself, who comes in from time to time to supply choir vocals. The nuances are everywhere, in production, mastering, mixing; you name it, it’s nuanced, and clicks without being massively overwhelming, disrupting or oblique; besides from the clusterf-ck that is “mania” (which we’ll get to), everything is very calm, and very serene. On a side note, some of the songs, such as “purification” and “restore” are of a certain vibe in that they are reminiscent of C418’s music for
Minecraft; while lacking in the same level of clearness for the most part, they both share a similar level of depth, atmosphere and emotional impact (though, of course, lacking in the nostalgia department, but that’s unrelated).
To further give the album kudos is that, unlike other meditation albums (I’ve heard so far), there is a sense of variety, instead of continual pattern; each song has a unique identity of its own, in terms of highs and lows, inner and outer consciousness. This gift of identity largely comes from nuance, but also in terms of the variety of instrumentation and their usage; no combination is the same, there is very little repetition and no choruses; everything on
The Storm Before The Calm is a continuous straight line on the way to a singular “spiritual” destination but the scenery along the way makes the ride interesting. Regardless, all of the songs, which are admitted very long, with the album’s total length clocking in at 108 minutes and spanning over two CDs (with four songs being over ten minutes long and another four are nine or so minutes long), are very, very satisfying in structure; nothing feels too short, and nothing goes on too long; it is surprisingly sound, and by the time the album ends with “vapor” and with its final ambient sounds, you are left feeling very fulfilled.
However, that’s not to say it’s completely a smooth sailing experience. Ironically, a problem of some annoyance is… well, Alanis herself. In some songs she is a little too high in the mix, and combined with the fact that you know who she is (and therefore an identifiable sound), you may end up fixating on her vocals rather than absorbing the music, which can pull you out of the experience a bit; this is best shown on “explore” around the six minute mark, and “space”. This problem also happens to a lesser degree with the wind instruments, which are very identifiable and a little protruding. On that note, a couple of songs are less immersive than the rest, and lean into “Ambient” than “Atmospheric”, such as “mania” and “explore”, which are somewhat tedious listens. The former of those songs, “mania”, is an absolute clusterf-ck of instruments, drums and jazz that is completely schizophrenic and a very much a “what the f-ck?” moment. While complex, it is not really warranting of much merit and its purpose on the album is largely confused. Of course, this error is largely resolved in a satisfactory manner with “vapor”, but this is the only song that doesn’t click whatsoever with the rest of the songs. A minor inconvenience, but nothing more, since it’s one of the shorter tracks.
The Storm Before The Calm is very much self-fulfilling in a sense; while not always being serene, is an overall interesting experience, though limited in its purpose; while great as a meditation record, it’s stylistically as alienating and “out of the norm” for both people who like meditation music and to fans of Alanis Morissette, just as much as
Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie was back in 1998; which, in a sense, proves Alanis still has the potential to push the boundaries of music and execute successful (albeit blemished) creative endeavours. Whatever way you “enjoy” this record depends on what you like, and/or works for you with meditation, I guess. Just don’t go in hoping it’s a typical Alanis Morisette record. Because it’s not, not really.
4/5
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Listen to the album here: https://orcd.co/thestormbeforethecalm
