Ian Williams – All Becomes Desert (Album – Slaughterback)
Genre/Influences: Ambient, Experimental, Abstract.
Format: Digital, CD.
Background/Info: London (UK) based Ian Williams has been already involved in projects such as Beautiful Pea Green Boat, Bushido and Gamine. He’s also the label owner of Slaughterback. “All Becomes Desert” is his newest solo-album, which is clearly inspired by the immensity of deserts.
Content: The work features 5 cuts, which are into pure improvisation although switching from pure Ambient to surprising Acid sequences to Abstract music.
+ + + : I like the idea of the concept, which has been created by the magic of analogue sound treatments. “Outback” is the most surprising and captivating cut for its Acid-like sound treatments transposed into a kind of Minimal-Ambient style.
– – – : Some passages are pretty monotone and into a free-styled Experimental format, which is hardly accessible.
Conclusion: “All Becomes Desert” is a fascinating concept created by pure Experimental Electro.
Best songs: “Outback”.
Rate: (6).
Artist & Label: www.slaughterback.com / www.facebook.com/MrSlaughterback Read the news on ‘All Becomes Desert’.
About Ian Williams
Ian Williams is a London-based electronic musician and the owner of the Slaughterback label. He began in Edinburgh in the mid-1980s as a founder of Beautiful Pea Green Boat, and Discogs also lists him as a member of Bushido, Cloud Horses and Gamine, the duo with singer Claudia Barton that produced two albums of piano-led songs. He wrote music for the contemporary dance company Ijad of Lebanese choreographer Joumana Mourad, released on Slaughterback as “Requisitioned (Music for Ijad Dance Company Vol. 2)” (2001), “In-Visible (Vol. 3)” (2010) and “In-Finite (Vol. 4)” (2013), after the CD “Chosen Lies / Delete The Bit” (1998).
The solo albums “The Dream Extortionists” and “Les Blessures Invisibles / Invisible Wounds”, a soundtrack for a documentary by Eric Michel, are dated 2020 on Discogs; Side-Line’s 2024 coverage gives 2019 for both. “All Becomes Desert” followed on 2 March 2021 as a download and a limited CD on Slaughterback. Williams recorded the five improvisations, “Kalahari”, “Sahara”, “Atacama”, “Outback” and “Gobi”, on a Roland Juno 106 straight to DAT before processing and mixing them on a modern setup; he also took the photographs, and Lionel Avignon at Hartland Villa designed the sleeve. Videos were made for “Sahara” and “Kalahari”.
Later releases include Slow-Motion Apocalypse (2023) and the companion soundtrack album Le Mystère Lucie (Dossier Secret) (2024). “All Becomes Desert” is his only Side-Line review to date.
Support Side-Line
More people read Side-Line than ever, and there is still no paywall and no advertising. Readers pay for it instead - from $5 a month.
Why we ask
Advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news organisations we have not put up a paywall, and we refuse to add annoying advertising, so we need to ask for your help. Side-Line’s independent journalism takes time, money and hard work to produce, and we do it to push the artists we like, who are equally fighting to survive.
Handled by PayPal.
I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.
