Slow, gazing layers of insomnia define these ambiental stages of both earthly and unearthly existance. Co-working with occasional glimpses of fretless bass and ebows, this listening experience is full of life, full of night. Where many ambient works achieve full effect from the beginning of the songs, Steve Roach's "Midnight Moon" is the complete opposite to this. By slowly emerging one layer, and letting that define the basic theme of the song, he then breaks in with more layers as the maturity of the comprehension of each fragmented idea moves ahead, hence the length of each piece.

What characterizes this work, is not so much the clearness of vision and impact of intentional motive, but the strong sense of something lively wanting to break free from the calmness, yet keeping itself in shape and order by the space and time allowed to play. This is most times felt when the processed guitar makes its appearances to enhance and provoke a certain mood within an already established general feeling or atmosphere. It's obvious where Steve Roach hints on this, and so he admittedly does very well.

Surprising to many, the overall technique used on this album is that of drone, yet, the music in many ways does not convey an experience like that of drone masters such as Lustmord or Maeror Tri. On the contrary, "Midnight Moon" safely accelerates within frames common to the ambient artists, that instead of presenting an immersive illusion through the subconscious, aims on that which to the mind is known, felt, perhaps experienced many lifetimes before. Listening to this work does in most cases not baffle or surprise, but instead play on things familiar with emotions induced at solitary moments of peace and inner harmony, and as such, the vision is always clear and honest, while still keeping its integrity of wondrous space travels intact.

The atmosphere is dark and wondering, contemplating over its own soul. The nature of this music can best be described as repetitive, but like artists of a similar musical standpoint such as Ildjarn or Beherit, this in no way intrudes on a hope for something profound and beautiful. Steve Roach drags each piece out until there is no beginning or end, until each ongoing melody and droning layer becomes relevant in itself to the larger picture of the whole presented. Through the constant recycle of slowly vibrating dark ambient layers, magical guitar melodies defined by five or six notes taken to their extreme lengths, and the continuing echoes of these moments combined, something wondrous, longing and seeking takes shape.

Undecicive, yet only to its benefit, as these special times of midnight moons are as taking long walks through a dead and sleeping city where the stars shine bright on the majestic nightsky; there is no disturbance -- only a clear sense of that which is unknown, but felt years ago. This paradox never makes itself a disturbance while listening to this ambient-tribal opus, as it becomes a natural part of its own creation, e.g. it wants to seek and find something unknown while alone with the memories of the past.

But while these strange sounds and feelings are obvious to any listener, the actual content or theme present in each piece, is that of timeless, spaceless experiences. "Ancestors Circle" and "Deadwood" are songs that define this idea, and whereas other parts of this dark ambient work are both lucid and hallucinating, wisdom of souls now dead and gone come back to life, yet, only inside the mind of he who is willing to listen and trust the soul of his own intuitional voice.

Almost disturbingly unknowing, Steve Roach on this album presents what should be his most worthy opus to date. The absolutely beautiful and entrancing visions produced as a result of tiny magical melodies and out-ouf-space ethereal key layers, send the listener, either deeply out of space or shortly into the mind of things that previously were dead and waiting. Haunting and encompassing a worldview beyond the current materialistic acknowledgements of those with ignorance and betrayal of the past wisdom gained, nothing can save this work from being a welcome experience a loomy evening of afterglow wonder.