Dalhous - Will To Be Well

'Will To Be Well' marks a critical new chapter in the development of Blackest Ever Black's ambassadors for RD Laing. Their 2nd studio album blooms with a richer sonic palette over 15 instrumental songs showcasing an increasingly disciplined approach to their compositions. Still taking inspiration from the life and works of RD Laing, as much as "more universal and enduring mysteries: the relationships between body and mind, illness and wellness, the physical and the metaphysical", their sound still operates in a curious schism, feeling at once in and out of step with current tastes, mixing the arcane and exploratory aesthetics of in-vogue new age and industrial synth music with the intricate contours and clipped rhythms of '90s AI/IDM. It's a style that prizes focussed, linear narrative over gymnastic jump-cuts or flashy sound design, harking back to the involving, emotional journeys of BoC or Bola and, perhaps most evocatively, the sweeping and rolling topographies of their native Scotland, winding a single-laned road from the ambient prelude, 'First Page from Justine' across the whirligig melodies of 'Someone Secure', to elegant airborne folk dance patterns in 'Abyssal Plane' and the bit-crushed drums of 'A Communion with These People' or 'Sensitised to This Area', and the radiant ambient glow of 'Transference'.