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Reviews

Steve Verity — Digital Planet
(Atomic City ATOM CD 03, 1995, CD)

by Henry Schneider, Published 2016-07-28

Digital Planet Cover art

I tried to like this CD, I really did! When I first popped it in my CD player the first few seconds of music blew me away! I thought wow! Here is a new artist composing electronic music akin to Klaus Schulze’s classic Picture Music. But after repeated listenings I feel compelled to offer some constructive criticism and hope that Steve Verity’s next release will satisfy my initial expectations. Verity apparently loves high frequency crystalline sounds layered on top of sluggish chord washes. Here is a little lesson in acoustics, kids. Please don’t make the same mistake he did. For a given volume, level high frequency sounds have greater energy than low frequency sounds. That is why high notes always sound louder than low notes when played at the same volume. That is also why your ears hurt or become tired after listening too long to high frequencies. Therein lies the main problem with Digital Planet — 60 minutes of the same high frequency timbres and little to no bass activity. His sonic spectrum is just too full, resulting in a muddy sound. In addition, Verity does not vary his tempo from song to song. My ears and brain just can’t last the hour, let alone make it through the 29 minutes of the opening track "Tales from a Digital Planet." "Less is more" is an excellent principle to apply to composition. Through judicious culling of his sonic events Verity could greatly enhance his music. About the only way you can enjoy this debut CD is in small doses of five to six minutes. I can only hope that Verity will learn from this initial outing and continue to compose and record. The potential is there.

Filed under: New releases, 1995 releases

Related artist(s): Steve Verity

 

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