Gruppo Di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza - 1967 - The Private Sea of Dreams

Quality: 3.5 out of 5
Trip-O-Meter: 4.5 out of 5

Somewhere past the precipice of sound, we find these avant-garde Italians making a curious racket. The ensemble began in 1954, obviously long before the psychedelic era, and their approach was along the more atonal side of contemporary classical composition than anything resembling popular music. Enrico Morricone was the most notable member of the group, although I have no evidence if he is part of this particular recording or not. Regardless, the mostly improvisational results here are definitely mind bending, and are sure to create a curious atmosphere in your music space.

Nothing here really resembles 'music' in the traditional sense of the word. We're looking more at alien soundtrack-scapes. There are plenty of seemingly random percussive and piano strokes scattered about the tracks, along with the occasional wailing horn. A few tracks like "Perfect Union," "String Quartet," and "Sunrise" scare me off with the screechier sound of string instruments, but I'm down with the more percussive odysseys of "Rkba -1675 Take One" and "Side One-Band Four." Honestly, even the more adventurous of you will probably find a few hits and a few misses on this one; it just depends on your personal tastes or aversions regarding abstract yet sparse orchestral sounds.

The big draw for me here is that this album is an interesting aural document of a specific artistic time and place. A few of you might be a little more up for the avant-garde orchestration, but I doubt that you're going to break this one out for your next dinner party. If you're looking for interesting nightmares, this could be a good bedtime album too. 'Private sea of dreams' could be 60's Italian code for nightmares for all I know.