Slow Meadow – Happy Occident – Album Review
by Killian Laher

Album number three from composer Matt Kidd, who records as Slow Meadow.  This time around the electronic influence seems more pronounced.  Opening duo Stella Fixarium and Artificial Algorithm feature big bright prominent keyboards and treated vocals, equal parts synthetic and organic. The latter is almost a bit like very slowed down Boards of Canada.  Tracks like The Future Belongs to Ghosts and Pareidolia float by in a zen like way… Pareidolia is particularly uplifting.  Elsewhere, we get unremittingly lovely piano piece Helium Life Jacket.  It’s not all a sugary rush, We Can Only Love Through Suffering has ambient overtones, while Liminal Animal morphs from glorious frontlines to a warped, distorted feel in parts. Fake Magic Is Real is foreboding like Mogwai but Everything Is A Memory has the stately grace of the National.  Another fine instrumental album in a good year for instrumental music.  It’s available here.

Track List –

1. Stella Fixarum
2. Artificial Algorithm
3. The Future Belongs to Ghosts
4. Pareidolia
5. Blink
6. Helium Life Jacket
7. Drifting Phonetics
8. We Can Only Love Through Suffering
9. Liminal Animal
10. Fake Magic Is Real
11. Everything Is A Memory

Artificial Algorithm