ETHER
Great Ocean Road (Self-released)
Reviewed by DJ Johnson

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Ether is the musical child of Garth Adam, a veteran musician from Australia who has played in several genres including some that would fall into the "pretty loud and chaotic" category. With Ether, he seems to be exploring the beautiful side of music, basing the sound around exquisite acoustic guitar tones, simple, unobtrusive drums and bass that serve the song without taking over, pretty electric guitar embellishments and his distinctive baritone voice, all wrapped in a light cloud of reverb. The tempo is deceptive. The trappings create the illusion of skating along slowly, but often the actual tempo is closer to middle of the road, and a few of the tunes are decidedly up tempo, such as "Cried All Night," a cute little song that has all the elements I described above with the added touches of a well-played mandolin and lyrics that feel like they're right out of the bubblegum era. How's that for a strange juxtaposition? Great Ocean Road is a fine album that doesn't sound like anything else, and I don't know about you, but that's something I'm always on the lookout for.

© 2003 - DJ Johnson