Honoring
Various Artists
Real Music
review by Jerry Rabushka
Here's an "I didn't know I had it" CD.... well it was sitting on a rack and I'm like "what's this?" Honoring goes towards the sacred, as the notes say, you can "rest for an hour in divine love."
In this case the love is a lot of very slow melodies, singing, or chanting over an even slower accompaniment, a lot of times ethnic instruments over a synthesizer pad. Most of this evokes India or Asia. The peaceful part of it, not Tokyo at rush hour.
Mostly it's cool stuff... standouts include "Long Life Chant" by Jeff Beal and Nawang Khechog, it's exceptionally beautiful both vocally and instrumentally. I like the guy's voice. Khechog co-starred on an album called Winds of Devotion a long time ago that's still one of my faves in the "new age/spiritual" department.
"Chidananda," by Deva Premal gives us a repetitive chant over a droning synth, there's a high tonic note that "makes it special," more or less, while simple chords change quietly underneath.
A 14-and-a-half minute cut from "Mother's Wingspan" by Ben Leinbach glitters in the same vein with flute, vocals, guitar, meandering again over a lush backdrop, and "Threshold Between Worlds gives us some Middle-Eastern sounds courtesy of Benjy Wertheimer.
The second track, "Chendren," has some odd warbling type vocalizing that might take some getting used to, and "Gayatri Mantra," sounded a bit too heavy on both vocals and synth, I think it needed more post production work to make it a bit less "in your face." But nothing to make you leave it on the shelf.
Anyway it's a good buy if you need to chill out and get in touch with yourself. A short second CD with a guided medition is also included.
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