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Prince In His Arms
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Colours
IAS 041 Prince In His Arms „Colours" Audio Surprise / Believe Digital, Vinyl Album Release on Friday January 24th - 2025
The name Prince In His Arms covers the solo project of the Stuttgart based music producer Ralv Milberg.
"Colours" is showing en détail, why he is well-known as a music producer for his broad palette of tonal colours and diverse versatility. Under the alias Prince In His Arms he steadily but scarcely releases precious contributions in the field of ambient, experimental and dub music for 25 years now. In 2005, after three years of studio work, his former album was thieved and as a consequence it became a tad more quiet about the solo work of Ralv Milberg. Now, 20 years later, he finally releases the longplayer "Colours", what can be regarded as a destillate of his complete work so far. No doubt, this work is a bit bulky in regard to commercial aspects, at least when it comes to the format - the album consists of just two long pieces - and is a plea for the stunted listening habits of today. The album should explicitly be played as an "ambience", while doing everyday things and along with an extended breakfast on a weekend. And at the same time it is super pop music.
There is simultaneously a truely delicate carved out richness of detail "behind the scenes" waiting for the ambitious listener, not least because of the superb mastering work of And.Ypsilon (Die Fantastischen Vier). Believe it or not it took seven extended mastering-sessions, where every milisecond of the 35 minutes and 27 seconds lasting opus was laid under the "electron" microscope. The edges weren't grinded off, they were just formulated with the finest granulation.
With only a few minor exceptions contributed by his present wife Anne, Ralv Milberg has played all sounds and instruments by himself, albeit he was gratefully making use of sounds and stylistics of some befriended companions. In the section called "seq 4" he used a sound generator developed by the synthesizer-guru Günter Schlienz that was triggered by a light barrier of a big wooden pendulum, that Ralv Milberg built in his father's basement workshop in 1999 for the stage show of the band Navel, at the time he was also a band member.
"seq 6" was already represented in its initial version on the stolen album in 2005 and is the only composition that Milberg has taken over for the present album.
On the original version one could hear the virtuoso and distinctive drumming of Nico Lazarakopoulos, which Ralv Milberg tried to immitate on the current version by himself, but at least with a much better audio quality, when it comes to the recording. Nonetheless Milberg does at no point shy away the game with his roots within the Lofi music and D.I.Y. scene, even if the technical quality is no longer a statement, as the album sounds fairly High End.
The album made of 15 sequences in total is organically grown together to such an extent, that the constant changes - between mono and stereo playback, between Compact Cassette, DAT, MiniDisc and quarter inch tape - do no longer have a notable technical quality, even the occasional and then significantly audible tape noise is inwrought as a musical element. This is by no means a "Best of" or "Greatest Hits" thing, but an ethereal-organic trip through all kinds of tonal colours and tonal layers, masterly compiled. Some listeners will appear colours for sure (and for each they are probably different), as long as he accepts to engage with this journey. It's worth it.
