Bleep

Gravitational Pull vs. The Desire for an Aquatic Life is not only a great title for a record but also a near perfect analogy of the genre tug and war (was it ambient electronica/post-rock/noise ??) that many would of placed Stars of the Lid in the middle of back in the mid 90's when they first let this album lose into the wild. It's five movements were truly the first essential chops from the group to catch peoples ears and imaginations, whilst its endlessly swelling tones also set the tone for the claustrophobic wing of Kranky's output for the next twenty years and up to the present day.

Gravitational Pull is as an album, somewhat lost in the mists of time (and a million and one other dark ambient exercises that have been moulded within its influence) arriving in the middle of the dominant “americana” scene of the mid 90s, Stars of the Lids second record was a quietly polished jewel within the decades burgeoning ambient and electronica scene. Slowly unfolding across five passages of defrosted guitar tones that slowly melt before your ears, carefully dripping into a vast warm swamp of shimmering melodies and ominous drones.

If you have ever been hypnotised by Eno and Fripp, late-era Talk Talk or the modern American zen of fellow Kranky artist Dedekind Cut, we urge you to drown deep inside Stars of the Lid's aquatic life.