First impressions: warbles, chirps, oscillating sheets of analog abound. At times extraordinarily experimental sounding, but at the same time engaging and planned. Lots of ping-ponging echoes and spacious reverbs give the impression of an area in which a syntheatrical plot entertains and occupies your mind...for a time.

The blatant allusions to early and mid-era Pink Floyd albums seem to insinuate (1) powerful synths weaving mind-bogglingly beautiful melodic contours; (2) spacerocker-length tracks with spontaneous yet familiar live solo-segments woven into darkened tapestries of prosaic chord progressions; and (3) an emphasis on the creation of a concept album. Aren't we simply surrounded by interesting concept albums these days... music for airports, music for films, music for grassbars, for arctic circle cave dwellings, music to substitute for the film's "real" soundtrack, music for sleeping, for ambient rodeos... but I digress...

The Dark Side of the Moog seems to me to be a meta-concept album for people who like a pinch of nostalgia in their ambient, but also ponder and appreciate the future of musical evolution. Wish You Were There, divided into ten equal sections for ease of access, is mostly beatless but is interspersed with some of the same percussion sounds as Namlook's Wechselspannung project (with Jonah Sharp). Liner notes advise, "Big sound system and medium to high volumes are strongly recommended." Not a loud one, a big one =) Well, at least they aren't givin' us optimum humidity and magnetic flux density (as on H222's Round Window). In any case, I did as I was told and cranked it. At times it's almost trance-paced (do I recognize the Sultan's bass drum patterns here?!) at others deep and spacey. The album starts out mellow and works to a rhythmic crescendo and everything comes together. Brooding and oscillating Moogs guard the entrances of some breathtaking frozen aural architecture. Namlook explores several different musical styles throughout the 51-minute length of the album. The excerpts on Genetic Drift did not properly prepare me for the full-length (do they ever though?).