Visions of Excess’s Sensitive
Disruption’s form, song progression and overall sound is so
clean, well-engineered and formulaic it is both entertaining and all too
familiar.
Belief Systems follows standard trance form. It moves from sphere with whispers to late subtle bass rhythms with voice-overs. It moves seamlessly in formulaic fashion to Transvaluation. An off-beat rhythm-centered piece peppered with the word “Transvaluation”. Clockwork Universe is a stronger piece, with all the dance/trance trappings of the genre. It is a fine piece, with some interesting motifs.
The Hibernating Man is a standout and an excellent use of preverb for more than effect. A slow trance journey that escapes lethargy. Focus of Light intersplices sphere with choral sounds and drop effects. The Expanding Wave is a regulated piece where rhythm creates the form of motive and sub motive. Startle Response is a nice trance piece that doesn’t glaze the eye. Musically stronger than the other offerings. Ritual Gaining is another minimalistic, rhythm-driven piece. It ads variety more for its EQ than its form. Object to be Destroyed is a fine piece that will rumble the woofers.
The album rounds out in typical dance-trance-dance-trance song progression. Sensitive Disruption is a cut a cut above the norm in a flooded genre. Electronica has had so many offerings from hobbyist, genius and everyone in between, that the separation between artists has become barely nuance.
Visions of Excess executes all the established forms of dance/trance well enough without deviation. It has all the required momentary nuances of sexual deviancy, social rejection and ethereal voice-overs; all subtle enough to be missed by those not listening very carefully. This is also its weakness. It is easily any one of the throw-away soundtrack pieces to action scenes in movies like Resident Evil, 13 Ghosts, 28 Days, or XXX.
There are tracks off Osamu Kitajima’s album Sweet Chaos that are still musically fresher and that was created in 1978. Osamu’s work Beyond the Circle is as strong as any modern trance work at 8 years old. Roxy Music from the 80’s established ambient sounds in analog that so many musicians still can’t get past even with all the advances in digital development. Brian Eno’s Music for Airports and Phillip Glass’s Koyaanisqatsi and Powaqqatsi broke ground in ambient. This just perpetuates the sounds created by others without expending on it.
Visions of Excess has created a very strong yet formulaic sound in a genre that has become so watered down that it is good enough to get in the movie, but not the soundtrack.
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