Album Review: Our April Tigers from Michael Whalen

Album:  Our April Tigers
Artist:  Michael Whalen
Label:  MWM/Spout (Six Degrees Distribution/InGrooves)
Website:  https://www.michaelwhalen.com

When singer-songwriter Yoko Ono made a guest appearance on the 1990's TV sitcom Mad About You, she requested that the documentary filmmaker Paul Buchman, played by Paul Reiser, create a film about the wind.  Bandleader Michael Whalen has not made a film about the wind but he has certainly made a recording that from the listener's viewpoint sonically illustrates the movements the wind, putting into a tangible form what the wind communicates from what it sees.  Imagine the wind in the role of an observer of the temporal world, and the audience is hearing what this observer sees and communicates using music as its form of expression.

Whalen's latest offering Our April Tigers projects such a sonic imagery laden in thought-provoking symphonies that audiences will relate to the sounds of nature from the voices of its ethereal elements and it animals to the tenderness of human sentiment.  Featuring Michael Manring on bass, Michael Brook on guitar, Jeff Oster on trumpet, and Karsh Kale on percussion and as the remixer, Whalen creates an ambient recording that elevates the senses, opening passageways in the mind in the vane of the New Age milieu.

The tingling vibrations and soothing atmospherics of "Over Water" is fraught in shimmering synth effects, sculpting elegant undulations and harmonious dreamscapes.  The music is magnetic, opening the listener's mind to an ethereal plane.  The recording progresses with the ambient facets of "Disappear," trellised in soft tremors and pulsating sensations, producing a peaceful and meditative mood.

"Morning Bell" creates a reflective ambience, shrouded in soundscapes that one could image nature making while in a state of peace.  The blissful and harmonious vibrations are idyllic while keeping the listener aware of the floating movements.  As serene as the music is, the listener never drifts away but remains conscious of the chord patterns, continually stimulated by the communication among the musicians.

The psychedelic glint of "Visceral Organ" brings an intensity into the recording clad in swirling synth effects moored by a steady cadence.  The ethereal ambience of "So Fragile" is blanketed in glistening effects and bubbly swells as Jeff Oster's silky trumpet toots weave in and out of the melodic progressions.  The sprightly stride of the instrumentation emote an angelic sonorous.  

Contrastly, the exotic Asian accent of Michael Brook's guitar strings sewn into "Hope Haunts" bolster the willowy mosaic, delivering a passionate narrative that expresses a sentimental message with a consoling touch.  The recording closes with "Temporality," projecting tropical bird-like chirps encircled in a futuristic atmosphere garbed in twittering effects.  From the viewpoint of the listener, the soundscapes give the impression of personifying nature in the tropics.

Whalen shows himself to be a proponent of artificial intelligence, and perhaps artificial intelligence had a heavy hand in his new recording, but the human aspect should not be overlooked.  Containing an abundant amount of ethereal soundscapes, a human sentiment comes through, a sense of nature communicating messages to the listener comes through, as though the wind is being personified in music.

The recording crisscrossed the globe with each musician contributing their parts from their individual studios, going between New York City, India, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.  Perhaps like the wind, the recording also traversed the globe.  The result might even impress Yoko Ono, being the documentary, in music form anyway, of the wind she had requested years ago.

Musicians:
Michael Whalen - producer, arranger, keyboards, bandleader
Michael Manring - bass
Michael Brook - guitar
Jeff Oster - trumpet
Karsh Kale - percussion and remixer