
Andrew Ostler
Released July 18, 2024, Edinburgh, UK
Os pulls back the curtain and reveals a gorgeous choir. Here we go.
I love it when people in our community who we think of as only makers/manufacturers remind us that they are artists and musicians—and, of course, likely started as such.
But to our defense, it doesn’t happen much where makers of modules perform and interact as artists amongst us and actually play their modules. I could count on one hand the times it's happened on Modular World. (And Os has been one of them!)
This is all to say that this release from Andrew Ostler (or, as we know him, "Os," the man behind the curtain of Expert Sleepers) is a shining example of makers making more than modules.

Andrew is no slouch on releasing music, and his rich discography on BandCamp shows that. And all the releases have their own space, and The Blind Sublime is a welcome new sibling.
Andrew has employed a virtual choir in the form of a high-end sample pack and weaves a saxophone and modular synthesizers along with orchestral and choral arrangements.
It’s…deep. Like right away. And to top it off, Andrew Ostler has released The Blind Sublime on heavy (180g) transparent blue vinyl—because, of course, he did.
Although I've known Andrew for only a few years, I’ve already learned that he just does things really well.
Here’s what’s written on BandCamp about this album:

“Andrew Ostler’s fifth album for the Expert Sleepers label continues his trajectory away from a sound largely based on synthesizers towards orchestral textures and heavily processed saxophone. Building on the string arrangements of his previous LP “Dots on a Disk of Snow”, and taking a heavy dose of sax drone from the earlier “Four Drones for Saxophone and Modular Synthesizer”, this record also adds a full choir, taking the music to another level of spiritual intensity.
The first side of the LP presents three compositions of a similar feel - the drones are, for the most part, relatively gentle, while chant-like choral arrangements drift and weave around and above them. ‘Affirmation’ is quietly confident, with a surge of intensity around the midpoint; ‘Confession’ is perhaps more tentative, the shifting canon of the voices threatened by a distant storm of distorted synth shredding; ‘Adoration’ restores the straightforward choral beauty, building to an unashamed cadence.
‘Meditation’, which occupies the whole of the second side of the LP, is a quite different affair. Here the drones are more intense slabs, the choir is more demonstrative in its emotion, and the ultimate climax the more devastating for it. The journey is longer, but the rewards are greater for the committed.”

I was so curious about the vocal arrangements, I had to ask Andrew. Here’s what he had to say:
“The choir is a sample library - specifically Orchestral Tools Tallinn.
Given the fairly strong Arvo Pärt inspiration on the album, this was a perfect fit! The only downside is that the library has no built-in "phrase building" features, so I had to do all that manually by stringing together round-robins to get the syllables I wanted.

The strings are Spitfire Chamber Strings, which I've really enjoyed using on my last few releases.
The thought with introducing the choir was to see if I could really embrace these relatively traditional, composed elements as the major sound of the album, instead of simply having them in a supporting role to the synths or woodwind etc., which I've always had at the fore.”
‘The Blind Sublime’ will be a return listen for me. The choral arrangements don’t overpower the other sounds and textures. And the arrangements are just so good.
Please celebrate this release with me - a cherished moment where the makers in our community stand as artists - as they always have.
Bravo.
"Os pulls back the curtain and reveals a choir." by Johno Wells 12/1/24
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