by Hugo Reyes (@hvreyes5)
If there is a unifying theme throughout Pile’s decade plus career it is this: don’t make the same thing twice. Each record has served as a reaction to the former and In The Corners of a Sphere Filled Room is maybe the most extreme example. It’s their first foray into ambient music, stringing together a collection of noise made between December 2018-January 2021. The few that bought Second Other Tape last year got a little taste but now a wider audience can hear this recent foray Pile has decided to take.
The first thing you notice when you press play on this Bandcamp-only release, is that each fourteen tracks are labeled with the same underscore. The band even makes a note of it, saying there are no songs on In The Corners of a Sphere Filled Room. At times you hear an indecipherable hiss of a voice, like on the second track but vocals are minimal at best. It sounds like an ominous message in a sci-fi movie, portending some doom to come.
What’s drawing you in is the little moments, which is where ambient music shines. Maybe it’s the way one note is sustained and lingers in the air; maybe it could be the hint of cello and viola that is interdependent through the record. All that matters is that the music maintains a spell over you, rendering the outside world nonexistent for a little while.