Tewksbury - "Vika"

Mastering the slow drift ambient track that composes across vast spaces of time (relative for a piece of music), it’s thrilling to watch Tewksbury work on “Vika”. Motifs dip and resurface. stretching into places beyond the stereo field - memories, reveries, constant cycles of emotional turmoil and pressures. It’s a beautiful piece and record to lose an afternoon in. According to the press release, “these unhurried, long-form works were recorded on very long analog tape loops on vintage ¼” multitrack reel-to-reel machines. Repeating patterns emerge and dissipate, notes drift and blend, melodies enter and pass, almost imperceptibly. And imperfections abound in this very-much alive record: Tape splices begin to fail, loops stray off the spools, reels’ speeds begin to drift. All of this is a reminder of the hand-made quality of the compositions, and the passage of time becomes an instrument, itself, as these works bring the listener on a meditative, personal journey. Tewksbury says, “I wanted to put out a collection of slow, meditative music, long-form works that take the listener on a journey that reflects on humans and our place in the environment, on nature, on the North, in a suite of four movements of long-form compositions. It’s a lot of music. I guess I’m still surprised at how much I had to say.””