Tuesday 16 June 2015

Terra Nine vs Squazoid 'Karuna E.P.' Review




Artist: Terra Nine 

vs Squazoid



Title: Karuna E.P.



Label: Altar Records



Released: 13th June








A collaboration that almost spans to the opposite side of the globe. Auckland based Mike Westcott electric voila fused ambient trance joins forces with Parisian global psy-chill producer Jeremy Bringué. The seed of this track was planted after an impromptu jam at a party in Jeremy's studio in 2013 where Mike played a few notes on the voila which grew into a few more and the basis of the piece was born add some bass, cello and more strings and they had found a piece that emotionally moved them to tears. They played the piece to some select artists who were interested in re-mixing the track and this is the long awaited result.

The E.P. begins with the original piece with an orchestral intro of hauntingly beautiful strings, while the electronics slowly and delicately gain volume and harmonic voices are added. Although they have their moments to shine they never overpower the orchestral spine of the piece.

Moving onto the re-mixes not surprisingly the first contender is Pete Ardron who often employs a classical underbelly in his own productions. In places his input is subtle with a little added ethnic percussion and at others he takes it up a notch some housey piano, wonderful key loops and panned reverb. The result is a lovely enhancement on an already heavenly piece.

The E.P. moves on with fellow Parisian Franck Jousselin (Kick Bong) who unexpectedly adds guitar to the strings and in places his own synth flavours that rest above the underlying sounds of the original but never entirely block it out. An interesting alternative that I wouldn't dismiss.

Unknown Reality (who previously were unknown to me) add a progressive trance vibe to the piece but maintain a strong orchestral emotion with their version. Once again I'm impressed with the result you can really fly into a dream with this one.


Next to imprint their take on the track is Terra Nine's label mate Astropilot who shifts the emphasis to the dancefloor with a rolling underbelly of a bassline, while still maintaining the heavenly voices and strings as you would come to expect with his own productions.

Another new face (or new sound even) for me is Cloower Wooma who utilise all the elements of the original strings and harmonic voices fooling me to believe this would be an atmospheric ambient take, where infact it they employ an elongated intro before stamping down the bassline.

Finally seeing out the E.P. is Suduaya who adds some dreamy piano and reverb to the voices with this blissful adaptation the term sofa sinking couldn't be more apt in this case. An absolutely superb slice of chill out.

Some may argue that 7 versions of one track is a bit too much. But in cases like this when you have such a lovely piece of music and a pallette of sounds from artists who know how to draw on the emotion and at times enhance aspects of it. I for one am glad there is.

Review by Woodzee

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