Today is as good as any to release a collection of tracks about rain on windows. A melodic, otherworldly, quiet electronics album to fit the view from my window in early January.
I have spent many hours travelling and looking through windows – cars, buses, trains, once on a boat and luckily on a few occasions, through plane windows above the clouds. Travelling is freedom for my mind, lost in my thoughts and in my own world, watching the world go by. Fleeting views of unnamed places, towns and countryside, forests, seas, hills and pastures.
Often, the view is transformed by the weather. Early morning hazy sunshine bathes the landscape in a warm glow. Ice and snow drain the fields of colour and raindrops reduce the view to abstract colours and shapes.
The tracks on ‘Through Windows’ are based on some of those journeys, real and metaphorical, on rainy days. Hours staring outward at the world passing me by. Fleeting views obscured by raindrops, sleet and bright sunshine. Hours tracing raindrops down windows, racing each other in multi rhythmic motions. Their traces leaving trails that join into larger drops, eventually too heavy, they are blown away by the wind.
Movement, blurs and momentary glimpses, here, and then gone, but preserved in my memory.
Slow Glass – Rain falls on windows, changes pattern and is held in momentary suspension, to eventually fall away.
Low Winter Sun – Through the Metro window, hazy shafts of winter light fall on snowy fields that stretch towards Penshaw.
Trails – Car wipers try to keep a clear view through myriads of raindrops, racing down the windshield.
Sentimental Sky – A famous Japanese photographer stares out of his dying wife’s window and records the telephone wires and sky on film.
Through Windows – Staring out of a hospital window on a stormy night, I watch as two raindrops meander, join together and then part, falling away.
Rivulets – Staring out of a car window, a game of follow the raindrops, racing each other, tracing their paths to the bottom, to be blown away by the wind
Rays – After the rain, fingers of light draw me homeward.
credits
released January 12, 2024
Composed, Recorded, Produced by O Johnson / Museleon
Copyright museleon2024
Field recordings used and reimagined, courtesy of the Freesound Community under the Creative Commons 0 Licence – Many thanks to barkenov, bradovic and freekit for sounds.
All other field recordings, music and artwork by O Johnson / Museleon
Best listened through headphones but beware loud noises.
There is perfection in imperfection
For Douglas and Evelynne
museleon 