Hello out there....

Here's the monthly news from Zero Music

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Monthly CD giveaway drawing
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The winner of our CD giveaway for the month of January is
Robert Walsh He's won a copy of Clour Glow" by Ashera.
Please note that drawing entry's do not carry over from month
to month. If you would like to be included in the drawing for
February you will need to re-register your name through Zero Music.
The CD to be given away in February is "Slow Heat" from
Steve Roach.

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Numina's "Recluse" OUT OF PRINT!
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The response was phenominal to Numina's ltd.
edition 3" CDR! It has sold out and is now out of print.
never fear though, as Numina will have a full length
release coming up this summer which will have
all NEW material.

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James Johnson / Ma Ja Le "SEED"
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The SEED has been sown! The album is complete and is
now finding a home for worldwide release. Mastered by
"Trevor Sadler" ("Narada" & Peter Gabriel's "Real World")
This is going to be the one to watch for in 2001! A release
date has yet to be set, but we'll let you know soon!

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Upcoming releases to look for in 2001
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James Johnson & Robert Scott Thompson
"Forgotten Places" (Spring 2001) - Zero Music

James Johnson
"The Butterfly Chamber" (TBA)

James Johnson & Stephen Philips (TBA)

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Reviews
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James Johnson - Linger

This "Digital Automatic Music" CD contains 5 audio tracks as well as
MP3 versions of the same pieces and software to play them, so you can
either play it in your CD player, or on a computer giving access to some
additional data about each track and about the composer.

But this is all extremely ambient stuff (Brian Eno and Harold Budd being
quoted as nearest points of comparison) so it's fair to say in summary
that this is almost an hour of extremely slow music. "Linger" was recorded
live on air in Toronto, layering bells, chimes and a deep drone over tapes of
gentle rain; "Floating and Dreaming", again a live-in-the-studio recording, has
some slow sequences running but is dominated by slowly evolving, rather
cutting digital sounds (the synths in use are an E-Mu Morpheus and Proteus
and a Korg Wavestation, though Reaktor and Gigastudio software gets a
look in there as well) and comes out sounding like Californian space music
of the mid-1980's.

"Riding the Fog Line" is smoother and much more reminiscent of Eno's
"Music For Airports" in its use of choir-like sounds, but "Siren Song" perhaps
surprisingly uses almost no voices - it's more or less a piano solo, very much
in the style of Harold Budd's extremely minimal compositions. The closing
"Frequency Shift" really layers together all the above ideas, featuring voices,
digital synth sweeps, and a generous quantity of slowly evolving textures.

Ambient music of this sort isn't meant to innovate or even to draw too
much attention to itself, and there has been plenty of it about since the
1980's.
This CD doesn't add much to the field, but is a good example of it if you want
to explore and experience this type of music.

E-MIX Magazine
http://www.ampmusic.demon.co.uk
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Steve Roach - Slow Heat

The first of Roach's new Timeroom Editions, "Slow Heat" follows in
Roach's ever-evolving ambient style that has produced recent memorables
"The Magnificent Void" and "The Dream Circle." Sporting a dazzling cover by
digital artist Andy McIntyre, the CD consists of one 71-minute atmospheric
piece designed to be played in continuous playback mode. "Slow Heat" resonates
with Roach's desert impressions. It does have a very warm feel to it, reminding
me of shimmering desert mirages and hot, quiet summer days. As Roach reflects
in the booklet, "there are certain times of the day when everything falls
silent,
as
if the birds, cicadas, and even the trees are under the spell of the heat." This
feel
is effectively reproduced in the atmospheres, an environmental ambience that
swelters and recedes, a wide pallet of sounds that varies lazily over the CD's
course. Since "Structures From Silence," Roach continues to produce longform
work of very high quality, and "Slow Heat" is perhaps his best yet. The sounds
echo the vastness of open spaces, the hum of nature, and the placidity of peace
and solemnity; the complex polytonal chords give rise to intense human emotions;
and the dynamics range from undercurrent to thunderous.

Expose'



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Zero Music
Ambient/Ethereal/Atmospheric music
http://www.zeromusic.net
sound@...
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