Acoustic guitar? Check. Spectral synthesizer? Check. Field recordings of waves washing upon the shore? Check. So begins “Prophet One” and Know Your New Age, a brand-spanking-new headtrip from Stuttgart ambient maestro Günter Schlienz, and it’s a meditative delight. All the ingredients are there for you to be able to zone out for 52 minutes, or several hours, or days, or whatever. You can immerse yourself in a sensory deprivation chamber or a futuristic recovery tank or above-ground swimming pool filled with gelatin, and Know Your New Age would work equally as well.
So the question then becomes: is Günter Schlienz a genius when it comes to this kind of thing? And even though we probably shouldn’t be throwing around terms with such hyperbole attached to them, it’s still something we should ask. It all stems from the perfect level of mysticism and magic interwoven into these tracks, like Know Your New Age is a literal call to familiarize yourself with the genre and Günter Schlienz is providing the primer, just like Benjamin Britten did with “The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.” But without any narration.
Right, so: yeah, Schlienz is a genius.
The liner notes themselves lay out the MO here, as “this is music to heal your soul, inspired by the works of Peter-Michael Hamel, Deuter, and Eberhard Schoener.” Know Your New Age does its trick lifting your spirits through internal stimulation, casting a trance over you that you can’t easily shake. The sounds become a part of you, adhering themselves to your bones, your flesh, your blood, all of the parts that aren’t the ears, and it’s a surprise when you realize how utterly engrossed you actually are. When the needle lifts and you blink and realize you’re in a physical room with all of your stuff (and record player), you’ll be hard pressed not to want to be back within Günter Schlienz’s world. It’s definitely something that’s tough to shake, but in a good way – the positive vibes will surely follow you throughout the rest of the day.
Perfecto.
Find your way: “The LP is released on transparent vinyl by Zuckerzeit Tonträger, a collaboration of Cosmic Winnetou and Zoharum.”
More about: Günter Schlienz
