Review: Droni Eye Omi ‘Live At Guild Cinema’
Droni Eye Omi (certainly one of the wittiest band names I’ve encountered in some time) is an Albuquerque-based ambient psychedelic, drone duo, featuring Brad Frye, the head of Desert Records, who also served as guitarist/vocalist of Red Mesa, and Ronaldo Baca, guitarist of Swing Magique, a gypsy jazz band, who also call Albuquerque home.
They released their debut, Liminal Mass, in March of this year, and to celebrate, they performed live for the first time at Albuquerque’s iconic Guild Cinema. The duo rightfully saw fit to document the performance, so here we have Live At Guild Cinema.
The performance begins with some tripped-out, echo-y dialogue, which essentially waxes on opening your mind and senses to Droni Eye Omi’s portal-opening abilities as Chromosphere, from their aforementioned debut album, slowly expands into a wash of guitar effects, that flow like slow-moving auditory lava and evolve with peaks and valleys of volume swells, and manipulation from the two some’s vast array of pedals.
Frye and Baca deftly manage to display a range of meditative moods, from the harrowing squalls and lead work to the doomy effects that envelop the listener in a sense of claustrophobia. Just as all hope for the universe feels lost among their crushing atmospherics, they loop into a spacey vibe and back again, showing their uncanny sense of dynamism lurking within their ambient drone attack.
a totally immersive, at times heavy, at times psychedelic, ambient experience that takes the listener on many journeys and through many moods…
Guitar Gongs, evidently a new composition, is an awesome, meditative, sonic journey through sounds and moods, much mellower and trippier than they displayed on the massive, haunting journey through the psyche displayed on Chromosphere. As well, according to the press, Frye and Baca had their sights on achieving the effect of making their guitars sound like bowed instruments. They seem to have achieved that, while also proffering an impressive array of immersive, ambient sounds.
To end their performance, they enlist the help of some friends, in the form of fellow Albuquerque musicians Roman Barham (Red Mesa, Scroll, Black Maria), Steve Schmidlap (Blue Heron) and Kristen Radfor Drone Circle. This adds some drums, more guitar, and an electric violin into the immersive journey into sound, wherein we get colossal squalls and volume manipulation. It builds and crashes like huge waves, all seemingly climbing towards some inevitable, celestial climax, before suddenly dropping into a mellow, psychedelic movement, which sees the collective through their performance.
Live At Guild Cinema is a cool release, a totally immersive, at times heavy, at times psychedelic, ambient experience that takes the listener on many journeys and through many moods, keeping their attention throughout. I would say for this reviewer, the recording was best absorbed through headphones, late at night so as you can really experience all the different sounds and movements undistracted that Droni Eye Omi present through these three pieces.
I’d also add, as an Albuquerque native, it was really cool to see this released as the Guild Cinema has been a local landmark for decades, and it served as the perfect locale for these musicians to craft this release.
Label: Desert Records
Band Links: Facebook | Bandcamp | Spotify | Instagram
Scribed by: Martin Williams
