As someone who uses a lot of words endlessly to describe sound for people who like to read such things, Dylan Simon has undercut me with the title of his latest. Cold Black Ragas for Love of All Forms gets to the heart of the matter. The two compositions are Middle Eastern-influenced, using but a vintage EML 101, hurdy gurdy, and farfisa. The vibe, again, is captured in the title. It’s a bleak, blustery world wherein meditation is to keep warm amid a barren world. It’s the quiet after the mushroom cloud, Simon contemplating the ends of the earth after they have been obliterated by a world too corrupt and fanatical to see what it’s doing to itself. But in this center—this eye of the mystical storm—there is hope despite the shroud. For in this dreary future, there is the rebirth of love. IT’S THERE IN THE TITLE! Dream Worlds may seem desolate but repeated listens find an enriching balance between zen drones and chilly isolation. Only in our center can we see the world for what it truly is, and sometimes it takes the most peaceful of us to slap the faces of power hungry fascists. Simon may be doing so from afar under the guise of “astral projection” but he’s really giving the finger to the plutocracy that would rather watch it burn that build it up.
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