Manual, Lost Days, Open Skies and Streaming Tides

reviewed by dave heaton

As Manual, the Danish musician Jonas Munk has been amassing a serious body of gorgeous, dream-like atmospheric pop music. It’s music in the ambient/electronic realm but also an example of his talent at composition, at not just creating mood but also giving these soundscapes an emotional heft and progression. His albums are epic, impressionistic works – a style visually represented by the snapshots of sunsets and late-night city scenes that generally make up the cover art.

And that body of music is even deeper than you might imagine, judging by Lost Days, Open Skies and Streaming Tides, a two-disc collection of “reworks, covers, rarities and unreleased works.” The cover art this time is a collage of the sort of snapshots that graced previous covers – and that’s appropriate, and this is a grab bag of music that nonetheless contains the same winning qualities as all of the album releases: grace, beauty, the sense of a journey, the sense of capturing light as it flickers past, time as it breezes past, the sun in the moment of rising and disappearing.

The covers and “reworks” – of Slowdive’s “Blue Skied an’ Clear”, Nick Drake’s “Black Eyed Dog”, Port-Royal’s “Karola Bloch”, Suvome’s “A Real America” and Jan Hammer’s theme song to Miami Vice -- show the diversity of his taste, yet all of this music makes sense in the context of Manual. There is a soft-pop side, a melancholy side, and of course an atmospheric-pop side to his music. Other noteworthy tracks include the 23-minute “The River”, a stunning minimalist epic (originally meant for a vinyl-only 2003 release, “withdrawn for financial reasons”), and “Marbella”, a collaboration with Robin Guthrie. 12 of the 20 tracks are previously unreleased; the others appeared on compilations. And all are a worthy example of, and continuation of, Manual’s legacy of moonlit, sun-kissed, carefully composed, heart-turning instrumental music.

{www.darla.com}