There are two parallel paths commonly followed by artists who embrace the technology of modular synthesisers. On the one hand are the futurists, artists like Nala Sinephro, whose exploratory philosophy stems from free jazz, minimal techno or spaced-out avant-rock. On the other side are what we might call the naturalists, who use their instruments to engage, with varying degrees of abstraction, with the natural (and by extension the human) world. Of course, there are crossovers – Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith has a foot in both camps – but Emily A. Sprague (who also sings and plays guitar in indie band Florist) seems firmly ensconced in the second group. She is in the respected lineage of artists stemming from Pauline Oliveros, locating her procedure in a wider web of composition that involves the listener and the environment as much as the artist.
New York-based Sprague’s patient and organic pieces have always shared something with the Japanese strain of environmental music that emerged in the 1980s with artists like Hiroshi Yoshimura, Inoyama Land and Midori Takada, music that was aware of its position in deep time and its own specific genius loci. So it’s no surprise to learn that Cloud Time was recorded live while on tour in Japan. It’s not so much an attempt to harness some of that country’s rich and unique historical, geographical and musical heritage as a way for Sprague to engage on a highly personal level with a culture that evidently means a great deal to her. The result is one of sonic wonderment, pitch-perfect in its amalgamation of ambient and environmental sounds, but also refreshingly human.
Sprague whittled down more than eight hours of recordings into an hour-long suite of seven tracks, all but the last of which are named after destinations on her tour. So, while there is an overarching theme, the nature of the work shifts noticeably from one piece to the next. And while this is ostensibly an ambient album, there is definite bustle and restlessness to certain passages. Opener Tokyo 1, for example, has an ever-moving shimmer, the sound of a metropolis waking and becoming busy (albeit in a tranquil, meditative way). For a while, it drifts into something approaching white noise, as if the city were moving out of focus, losing you in its haze. Rather than chronicling a fraught, sweaty commute, this is music that takes a step back and retreats into the city’s quiet spaces to watch the world from behind a pane of glass or a garden fence.
Sprague’s music has always been concerned with deep contemplation and Cloud Time is no different. Osaka’s gleaming ambient tapestry is enriched with pulses of synth, an invitation to withdraw from everyday concerns. Nagoya is warm and glowing, a sonic sunrise, slowly covering everything around it in a kind of liquid gold. Matsumoto, near the geographical centre of Japan, is also the centrepiece of the album, a ten-minute excursion into deep listening and deep time that feels like a direct conversation with some of those classic Japanese environmental albums. Sprague understands that the environment is a phenomenon that encompasses both human presence and the passage of time, and her music reflects that with beauty and utter clarity.
This is music that transports you, but not in a psychedelic sense. Listening, you feel somehow anchored to yourself, more cognisant of your place in the world. Sprague teases out improvisations that skirt the boundary of melody and minimalism, a technique that keeps you hooked on every moment. Hokkaido’s combination of thick ice-sheets of droning sound and liquid, lullaby-like melodicism represents a kind of conversation or narrative. It’s often difficult to gauge just how long you’ve been listening: these pieces are neither epic nor miniature, concerned as they are with the exact moment of their creation.
Closing track Each Story is awash with textural layers of synth, hinting at neo-classical music of the most glacial and restrained kind, but the freedom and spirit of improvisation is always tangible, as it is throughout the album. This combination of deep care and off-the-cuff creativity makes Cloud Time one of the most stunning and surprising ambient records for a long while.
Cloud Time (October 10th, 2025) RVNG Intl.
The album is available on vinyl, Japanese import CD, and digital formats.
Pre-Order: https://lnk.to/rvngnl130