Solstice

by Steven E. McDonaldDeliberately mysterious electronic music supported by pulsating rhythm structures that sometimes come into their own, Solstice should stand as a musical bridge between the present and the magical images of the past. Alas, it does not work quite this way -- the music here falls prey to one of the more ordinary futilities of that present, in that it has a clockwork tenacity in the rhythmic structure to which many of the instruments succumb. The result is less engaging than disconcerting, turning the whole into the avatar of a Pagan celebration gone rather pear-shaped.