There have been a few reviews appearing for VANITAS in the past week. Not sure what to make of the popularity among folk in the Netherlands, but it is more than welcome.
Here is a roundup of press and listener reactions:
“Meditative and reverential… Wondrous and startling”
Compulsion Online (UK)
“There are few more nocturnal musicians than Michael Begg. I do not exaggerate when I place him in a high firmament alongside Arvo Pärt and Coil. Begg’s is a music to make the twilight last, and in that liminal area he sets his table. We listen and shudder, while we still have the time.”
Denis Boyer, Feardrop (Fr)
“Over the years Michael Begg has brought us some great works, crossing borders – from atonal quietness to orchestral expansiveness… keeps the listener captivated on a coherent album that makes great sense.”
Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly (NL)
“it’s remarkable to ponder how accomplished and visionary his work is… A gorgeous sound palette which he uses to paint tantalising shadow realms and infinite night skies”
Norman Records (UK)
“Glorious. Magnificent work.”
John Kealy
“I’ve just listened to Vanitas and I’m blown away. It’s a hugely immersive work – I quite lost track of a sense of time. At turns heartbreaking, melancholic, unsettling, uplifting and transportative, it has a deeply emotional resonance. I think this is going to be one of my favourite Human Greed/ Michael Begg releases.”
Grey Malkin, The Hare And The Moon
“The music he creates with his ‘cheap tools’ and his ‘doomed junk instruments’ bears every sign of a brilliantly creative composer… the kind of artist that does not conform to imposed rules but pushes the boundaries into unknown territories to be explored.”
Ambient Blog (NL)
“He paints the nostalgic panoramas of his dreams in a tranquil, subtle but extremely exciting way with tender brush strokes. It is all of unprecedented, fragile beauty.”
Subjectivisten / The Shadow Cabinet (NL)
“Decadent flows intertwine with filaments of imploding chaos and soaring drones… Essential and penetrating.”
Paolo Bertoni, Blow Up (IT)
