Specta Ciera & Arbee ‎- Unified Formations (2018)

Delicate and most strangely created, the Carpe Sonum collaborative debut by the enigmatically nicked Specta Ciera and Arbee is a wondrous slice of ghosttronica seemingly forged in hauntological climes where the spirits of 90s IDM’ers lurk about. Recalling such ancestral stalwarts as Norken, Pliiant, Bigeneric, and artists of similar stripes, these two have joined forces to excavate from electronica’s rich history all that was luxurious, sublime, and intoxicating about the genre when it’s bubble peaked two decades ago. Syrupy synthesized homilies, irising atmospherics, and softly purring asides arc above rising thermals of time-stretched beat patterning that reach for the heavens. The two-part opus that makes up “Lanterns” offers a crystallization of the duo’s ambitious sonic goals: quiescent, alien thrush and static caught in echo-chamber flux, in a near-perfect example of slow-motion kinetic synergy. Dynamic pillow talk for lethargic synthetes.