Aidan Baker: Still Life

Perhaps best known as a guitarist of the soundscape stripe, Aidan Baker opts for more traditional instrumentation, with piano, drums, and bass on Still Life, a four-song adventure that is, more often than not, beautifully realized and filled with many moments of gorgeous, imaginatively-performed music. The opening “Still Lives” develops slowly, patiently, like a dream directed by Morton Feldman; its successor, “Remembered Time”, offers more of the same but possesses an even deeper beauty. “Refuge From Oblivion” is a fine reminder that the contemplative and sedate moments of the previous two compositions mean much less without a loud, tension-building piece to provide a counterpoint. The closing “Complex Iconographical Symbology” sees all the album’s disparate elements coalescing quite nicely.