"substrate" is the latest effort from native Californian Stephen Sciallo

The title describes the music appropriately. Everything is a surface where the music exists and the listener is merely an observer passing by.

These are not pieces to be enjoyed while getting a massage or contemplating your oneness with the universe. They are anxious, restless and evoke a sense of uneasiness that has no resolution.

Even the most accessible pieces such as kathedra or anemoi have underlying tension that suggests a discomfort with itself as if any tonality, however minimal, is out of place.

Mutase abandons all pretense of civility with its mash up of lo-fi, through the glass darkly drones, clicks and electronic rumbles. Strophic floats in mid-air like a muggy fog that envelops the listener.

This album is worth a late night listen.