Album review: Valentin Stip “Sigh”

by Aedyn Roze

Valentin Stip’s Sigh is a mind-transforming experience in its ambient-electronic genre.  This eight-track album released by Other People is saturated with contemplative vibrations of a world that’s somewhere more.  Beginning with “Tableau II” and “Pendule”, Stip introduces the listener gently into a different reality – one in which we are the traveler, seeping through an altered realm via the liquified and distorted effects.

Born and raised in Paris and having immersed himself in different cultures throughout New York City and Europe, Montreal-based, Valentin Stip, unquestionably leaves marks of his cultural reflections in his music.  When the piano comes into the soundscape of the third track, “Aletheia”, an added depth starts to extend into the rest of the album.  The chanting mixed with worldly beats provides a mood that can easily suit a night of relaxation; meditating to the sound of each note or a night of expressive dancing; encapsulating the flow of energy and sensual bass lines/beats.

Sigh is a carefully composed album, paying perfect attention to the escalation of emotion and time and to the delicacy and layering of piano, percussion patterning and insertions of chants/angelic vocals in order to provide an enriching, aural environment for the listener.  Each resonating note builds upon the album’s atmosphere of mystery, while the piano melodies engage the listener to feel and partake in an innocence that many overlook or forget.  Audiences will find themselves at an unexpected peace while listening to this album.

Sigh is out on February 24, 2014 on iTunes