Ambient Sunday does study beats with: Ease & Taste, Arms and Sleepers, and ponders #Ambient #Chill #StudyBeats @MasonParksMusic @armsandsleepers

A triple bill of study beats for Ambient Sunday from Ease & Taste, Arms and Sleepers, and ponders.

Ease & Taste is a Berlin-based producer duo working together since 1993. The duo consists of “Mad Ease” and “Timmy Taste”. Both are producers, arrangers, sound designers, and performers. They met in the early nineties, shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, in Dessau, Germany.

Fruits of the Vinyl Tree is a track from their 2021 album on the same name. This owes lots to that 90s chilled production so beloved of Kruder & Dorfmeister and Nightmares on Wax. Of the track, they say, “Who once tasted the fruits of the vinyl tree, we will not forget the feeling of ease and taste and come back again and again.”

There’s a wistful, dreamy intro with little pitter-patter beats and a bit of romantic piano. And then beats proper arrive giving the track a bass-filled low-slung appeal. The piano stops things from getting too dark, lifting your eyes heavenwards. There’s a lush analogue feel to it all and a smell of dusty warm summer.

There’s a delicious dreaminess to Arms and Sleepers. But also a dark side. Arms and Sleepers is Mirza Ramic and his new album Former Kingdoms focuses on his experience as a child war refugee. He explains that, “After his father was killed in the war, Arms and Sleepers member Mirza Ramic fled Bosnia with his mother arriving in the United States in 1996, without speaking English, to live in Arizona. Exactly 25 years later, in July 2021, Ramic sat down to write an album dedicated to the memories of first arriving in the US, far removed from everything he was previously familiar with and at the footsteps of a new life ahead.”

The features track is my L aka my life. The tune is built around a gently tinkling piano of reminiscence. There are beats that thud away with a bass depth and a female vocal sample repeating my life. This is dreamy and yet insistent. It remembers days that are gone and days gone by. There’s a sadness at its heart but also a beauty in the clarity of the production and approach.

And so to ponders (aka Mason Parks, which might be another pseudonym) from San Diego, USA. Nothing much offered by way of a biog. So let’s focus on the track peace of mind.

peace of mind is a super slow track. Lots of surface noise to give it that analogue feel. LoFi beats tip tap away. But the focus of the track is some delicious electric piano lines. They have a languid soulful air. And little tinkling phrases to tickle the synapses. It’s all terribly, terribly woozy. Even some temple bells to remind you to relax. There’s nothing for it than to curl on the floor, surrender to the track, and wash your cares away in the balm of the notes. Perfect peace for the mind.

~ by acidted on March 20, 2022.