All India Radio: Each Other

The Australian trio All India Radio creates ambient electronic soundscapes mixed with a bass line, a beating drum, and sometimes a guitar. They also weave human voices into the blend as well as samples of conventional instruments — especially a violin — and odd sonic elements from various unknown and disparate sources. The result can be downright spooky and a little disturbing. It’s hard to imagine anyone chilling to this. But it’s also hard to imagine anyone doing anything else with this music. The music possesses a brittle, crystal clarity that evokes being alone on deserts of sand or a distant planet with an oxygen free atmosphere. Despite the group’s name, this disc has nothing to do with India or the radio. Despite the album’s title, this album seems particularly lonesome and lonely. The music seems sincerely executed rather than ironic. Maybe the point is that it’s only when we are alone that we realize how much we need each other. The dreamlike quality of the disc suggests that it may be best to listen to this with a friend or risk living in a nightmare world by oneself.