The Desert Inbetween
The Desert Inbetween (2011) is the collaborative album by ambient musicians Steve Roach and Brian Parnham,[3][4] containing Southwest surroundings.
| The Desert Inbetween | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by Steve Roach and Brian Parnham | ||||
| Released | January 11, 2011 | |||
| Studio | The Floating Point Studio and The Timeroom | |||
| Genre | Ambient | |||
| Length | 66:45 | |||
| Label | Projekt | |||
| Producer | Steve Roach and Brian Parnham | |||
| Steve Roach chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |    |
| Hypnagogue | favorable[2] |
Songs
The first track, "Opening Sky", contains the didg pairs up with Roach’s ambient guitar. The second track, “Ancestral Passage”, features the eerie muted radio voices, giving way to rolls of thunder and desert-wind pads. In the third track, "Serpent Gulch", contains driving, percussion-fed downward charge with a rhythm built on analog-synth lines, clay pots, drums and Parnham’s curling, insistently chanting didg. The fourth track "Somewhere Between" consists of ritualistic rhythms, featuring the tones of a waterphone vying with sharp metallic clanks and clatters, the patterns coming out like a makeshift invocation, Parnham’s hypnotic drones stirring the mix. The fifth track, "Spirit Passage", features the soft space with the ghostly voices. The sixth track, “Return to the Underground”, consists the tribal with pulsating wave forms.
Reception
AllMusic rated the album a 3.5 of 5, stating "The Desert Inbetween is almost a natural outgrowth of their individual approaches".
Hypnagogue highly rated the album, saying "It is a richly dimensional concatenation of purposeful sounds that ricochet in rhythm around each other to create the space as they go, every one of them integral".
Track listing
All tracks are written by Steve Roach and Brian Parnham.
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Opening Sky" | 11:03 |
| 2. | "Ancestral Passage" | 9:19 |
| 3. | "Serpent Gulch" | 11:11 |
| 4. | "Somewhere Between" | 7:13 |
| 5. | "Spirit Passage" | 4:14 |
| 6. | "Return to the Underground" | 17:14 |
| 7. | "When the Raven Flies" | 6:31 |
Personnel
Adapted from Discogs[5]
- Michał Karcz – cover images
- Sam Rosenthal – graphic design
- Steve Roach – composer, arranger, recorder, producer, mastering, electric guitar, synthesizer, electronics, waterphone, sounds, ocarina, percussion
- Brian Parnham – composer, arranger, recorder, producer, synthesizer, didgeridoo, udu, shaker, sounds, engineer, bass guitar, percussion, other trace elements