Nils Frahm
All Melody

THE REVIEW

"All Melody" (Erased Tapes) by German composer and musician Nils Frahm stands out as one of the most talked-about albums of this early year, given the author's great popularity, the various accolades received over the years, and the richness of content in this latest album. Recorded entirely at the "Funkhaus" on Nalepastrasse in the Oberschoneweide district of Berlin, once the location of the DDR's Rundfunk, where in one section of the historic building, literally rebuilt from top to bottom, he has set up his new recording studio called "Saal 3" over the past two years, this new spatial dimension also constitutes one of the elements in writing the new album, which Frahm wants to be linked to a sensation of total freedom and absence of restrictions.

Expanding his arsenal of instruments, adding strings, trumpets, timpani, gongs, and the bass marimba to the piano and synthesizers, from the very first track ("The Whole Universe Wants To Be Touched"), "All Melody" introduces the conceptual theme of the work and offers a wealth of varied and evocative sounds and suggestions. The composition has a somewhat solemn and almost sacred character, encouraged by the use of choirs and reprised in "Momentum" or in the ambient glimpses of "Harm Hymn". Cinematic piano compositions like "My Friend the Forest", "Forever Changeless", "Fundamental Values" glide lightly along his fingers like traveling through our memories, yet it is the recordings of concrete music that are the true heart of Frahm's work. Long sessions of minimal yet dynamic electronic music, as in the reverberation-rich soundwaves of the title track, the spatial dimension of "#2" and "Kaleidoscope", or the conceptual naturalism of "Sunson" or "A Place", "Human Range".

Nils Frahm effectively presents himself as a kind of visionary artist even on a morphological level, literally transforming his instruments like an alchemist according to the needs and sounds he intends to reproduce. His work is a complex neoclassical piece, light years away from more accessible electronics and, as always, does not transcend the conceptual contents such as those concerning experimentation. It opens the door for himself and his listeners to a truly new universe.