Echo Us Return from the Abyss With New Celtic-themed Album
In late 1996 Ethan Matthews recorded his first ever commercially available piece of music as a then 18 year-old guitarist working with electronics and ambient music. “Satre Dance” fell in right alongside all the new age and ambient music of the time. However Matthew’s mainstay in his early years, the progressive metal act Greyhaven is still known today as one of the pioneering, independent bands of the genre in the 1990s, having combined new age ambient music with progressive metal. Satre Dance represented a completely different area of expression for Matthews- a more relaxing kind of creative muse that foreshadowed where his music would navigate to in later years with Echo Us. Satre Dance was originally released on an independent label compilation in the UK in October 1998. It is reprised on the new Echo Us album, recorded on hammered dulcimer as it was originally intended, and re-titled “Aeriel”.
“Back then I was very into my electric guitar playing and my own short attention span prevented me from learning acoustic instruments in the way I do today. Although, at the time I still had the knack for a very simple melody – it’s kind of like Haydn in that way, it’s kid’s music in some ways and always felt very innocent”. (Matthews)
The rest of the music from “Wake a Dream in Moving Water” is all new, composed and recorded during the first few months of 2017. Although Celtic influenced and comprised of a number of re-workings of Irish folk tunes and Breton aires, the album is still in large part new and original Echo Us music that fits right in the Echo Us ‘canon’. “Wake” is a natural progression from “A Priori Memoriae”, which was released to critical acclaim in Europe in 2014.
To Wake a Dream in Moving Water is Echo Us’ ‘Celtic’ album that was planned for a long time but never executed because of the work on the trilogy that came before it. The album title is a typical ‘Echo Us’ play on words which one can find their own meaning.
“It is also both evocative of the Oregon rain, which I am told is not too unlike the rain in Ireland.”(Matthews)
“To Wake a Dream in Moving Water” is also a comment on conception- which was unintentional when the lyric was written. Matthews surprised himself a few months after writing it, realizing that the song was actually about the nitty gritty, biological workings of what happens when a child is conceived. The folk song it derives from musically describes a courting ritual, one that even today we can all relate to in our own way.
“Come With Me Over the Mountain” in acapella was the musical inspiration for the song, and came into my consciousness after the lyrics were written a few months prior. “ (Matthews)
As with all Echo Us recordings, a number of seeming coincidences resulted in connections being drawn where prior there were none. Another experience of similar capacity was found in oboe samples from A Priori Memoriae
that echoed the traditional “May Morning Dew’, also reworked for guitar on the new album.” (Matthews describes more in the EPK for the album HERE )
A music video for the track Begin to Remember will be released in tandem with the album on November 29th. The album will be available as a physical CD in the United States and Europe. Special order offers for European fans will be available through a pre-order system on www.echous.net
Source: www.echous.net
