I once read a review of Ashera's Colour Glow that posited the music therein was inescapably derivative of past ambient works, too obviously pretty, and lacking in creative inspiration. This is why I dislike music reviews, and, in turn, why I started The Ambient Review. If there are no voices of sense in this world, no written words in this world that can trumpet the pursuit of beauty, the search for radiant meaning through art; if there is only the insistent murmur of "not difficult enough" or "not demanding enough"--then we truly should not appreciate art and music for what it is. We should give all of our intellectual and artistic pursuits up, and dwell in some grey aesthetic factory--no music, no art, just the dronings of some florid music critic. Thank heavens criticism is only an opinion--what world would we live in if it were truth?

It is in this spirit of unabashed beauty and unobfuscated charm of composition, we have Enviro, the fifth album by Australian ambient artist Ashera. This is pure atmospheric ambient music, in the undiluted vein of classic Harold Budd releases like The White Arcades. Budd pursued beautiful music for its own sake, as a reaction to many of the more difficult experimental composers of the time. Anthony Wright, as Ashera, has the same goal; arguably in a musical landscape where beauty is often looked upon as a negative or "easy" attribute rather than a positive, enriching quality. This attitude is abject nonsense--Wright has crafted five albums of utmost beauty, the type of beauty anyone can find in their lives--if they know where to look.

Enviro's cover portrays a colorful landscape of washed-out skies, bloomed fields, pastoral farmhouses and their occupants. Listening to an Ashera record recalls all the greatest childhood memories--whether you grew up in a bucolic landscape like the cover's, or a booming metropolis (or somewhere in between, like myself). While the practiced Ashera formula is indeed present here, echoing past triumphs like the before-mentioned Colour Glow, the first lilts of track one, "Welcome Aura Mar" remind us this is a newer, fresher work--mindful of earlier work, but with a forward outlook. Wright's instrumentation has always been deceptively simple--warm synth textures, pretty female vox, bell tones, and other accents. This usual spareness of sound makes new vocabularies all the more stark and exotic--in this case, a sonorous organ or a mellotron-type synth sound. Wright's attention to breathtaking sounds and the all-important spaces between notes is impeccable--rivaling Budd's, to this listener's ears. "After the Drought" has an almost tentative feel, as if a child looks slowly around a corner wondering what she might view. Here, there are no horrors--only marvels, like a colossal never-ending summer. This is the understated strength of an Ashera CD, it is the sound of the feeling you get when the world spins around you, and you and the universe seem to move in unison--a joyous, harmonious dance of life well-lived. "Two Be Three" is a dramatic tableau of shifting organ tones, somehow serious but welcoming. Here we hear: looking into a new lover's eyes, all that mystery yet unfolded. "Smile and Nostalgia" pretty much sums up the terrific appeal of Ashera for me--it is unquestionably the type of listening experience that brings back pleasant, ethereal memories unbidden. Childhoods well-spent reading good books, playing in innocent harmony with other children, laying back on warm, dry grass, and imagining the earth move beneath as the clouds inexorably roll by. I often find myself sighing when listening to music of this nature--it's really quite an invigorating tonic.

The tracks of Enviro wash over you repeatedly, warmly cascading, inducing guilty chills down the spine. If this is music that should be ashamed of itself for not breaking down creative barriers, or being difficult, rigorous listening--well, count me in as one of the happily ashamed. This is music that will remind you of lovers, past and present; old glories, relived. I want to be reminded of these things, and this music takes me there every time. This is the music of a better world, where everyone knows when to slow down, smile, relax. If a little beauty like this can be shared as simply as listening to a recording like this, the world is in good hands with Anthony Wright's Ashera project. Enviro is seventy plus minutes of pure bliss; like staring into a cerulean pool's depths just because it's gorgeous. Perhaps Enviro answers no questions, assumes too little. Perhaps. But this record promises no answers in the first place. It is solace, pure and simple. It serves as a reminder that beauty is not lost in this world, nor should it ever be. Anyone who tells you to be ashamed by the appreciation of unassuming beauty is a fool--one should cherish it in all its forms, large or small. Though Enviro is not the tour de force performance of the previous Ashera work, We Gaia, it is a more than worthy entry in Wright's recent, stunning career in modern ambient music. And that is nothing to be ashamed about. My highest recommendation.

Available on Ashera's website.

since July 15, 2003