Ami Dang - Parted Plains review | Ammar Kalia's global album of the month

The Guardian 80

(Leaving Records)
Dang’s self-assured album brings elements of unease to stillness, with keening melodies and multilayered sounds

The line between ambient music and muzak can be a fine one. The former is “an atmosphere, a surrounding influence: a tint” to envelop the listener, music “intended to induce calm and a space to think,” according to Brian Eno’s liner notes on the topic, while the latter has become a watchword for unremarkable background sounds; stuff to merely fill a room’s silence. To the uninitiated, both can occupy the same murky generic space of the spa or hotel lobby – music that is as ignorable as it is interesting.