egokind & ozean: transition

After releasing his stunning debut Diamond Days on Traum and the follow-up Nothingness EP, Egokind told the folks at Traum that he had the idea for an album already sitting in the back of his head. To be able to convert all of his ideas he asked his long-time friend and collaborator Ozean to work with him. For both of them Transition is their debut album, but both artists can draw on a lot of experience recording music from multiple genres. Transition combines eccentric and modern-sounding club tracks, interludes which are based on improvisation and composition and mesmerizing downbeat trax. That Transition feels personal is due to their individual approach of not paying attention to establishing formulas but to listening carefully to themselves and developing their own formula. As a result you will not find one sound on the album which has been played with a synthesizer. Instead, all is recorded and transformed, using guitar, Rhodes, piano and manipulated voice. The album starts with "Mega," which begins rather acoustic, inviting you into the private world of Egokind & Ozean, before it becomes a joyous Balearic tune that, despite its wealth, keeps slight dissonances coming and going. "Flying Sparks" is a minimalistic track that connects to post-rock aesthetics of the '80s, using means of collage to give it a structure. "Every Time You Smile" is an energetic piece of warped music which swells and diminishes into small islands of voices that turn like mad, creating a new cosmos almost comical at times, but always very kind and gentle as well. "Mute Memories" is maybe the most melancholic and dark track of the album and the first and only one to really build a bridge between two contrary musical themes. The track plunges without warning into a downbeat that is constructed out of cut-up sounds creating an exceptional slow-motion beat. "We Float Around (And Hang Out on Clouds)" starts with an eruptive downbeat groove that is super-sexy. Heavenly sounds glide and are overdubbed by small improvising bits. "Light Realms" is a delicate and airy minimalist composition that dives into deeper territories, at times using a sonic language, slowing things down so you witness how the sounds blend in real time. "Silverbird" then opens the curtain and lets the sun fill out the whole room with yellow golden rays. "Everything Around You Is Resonating Light" is a track with flickering melodies -- simplistic and melancholic. "Future Fireflies" is a masterpiece with a lively "percussive" rhythm that is separated by harmonic vocal layerings and enriched by happy/sad melodies. "Eclipse" is a short sound experience and a bit like an episode with voices in tremor. "Everybody Dance Now" is a hi-energy dance track, still keeping one big surprise to come half-time, with a fantastic acoustic intermezzo. "Euphoria" is the last track of the album before the bonus tracks "Diamond Days" and "Sinus." "Euphoria" is is a very cool juxtaposition of different motions all lined up next to each other... but eventually leading to a euphoric final passage of distorted orchestral brilliance. "Diamond Days" and "Sinus" (recorded with Ozean) were released on Egokind's first EP on Traum and were added as an extra for you.