Morgan Packard - Airships Fill The Skies

Morgan Packard
Airships Fill the Skies
(07.2007, Anticipate)
8.5/10

Ezekiel Hong’s Anticipate label has quickly become one of my favourite new labels. Seemingly releasing only the very best in terms of minimalist, experimental electronic music, the label deserves attention for the selective restraint with which they release beautifully progressive music. Morgan Packard’s Airships Fill the Skies in the second of four spectacular releases this year for Anticipate and is typical of their higher than high production standards. The album embodies a distinctively organic air that permeates this very digital music. Packard marries tiny blips and bleeps with organic samples and beautiful instrumentation forming a paradisiacal down tempo treat. This is the kind of music that resonates well in dim lights and at early hours. If you’re not a night owl, dimming the blinds will provide the same nostalgic fervor. Packard’s compositions are carefully fractured so that their prescribed beats begin to slowly tilt and sway off the mark with glitchy electronic flourishes riding them to their soft-spoken doom. With Airships Fill the Skies, Morgan Packard has created minimalist electronic music without it ever sounding like “electronic music.” A highly endorsed album from a highly endorsed label – it’s a win win!

-Mr. Thistle