Although there's been lots of speculation around the previous records, all of the Environments albums have been marketed as 'lost albums' from their '90s period, despite the very clear progression into newly recorded material as the series has gone on. Still, even volume 4 had 'Fibrillation', which has its origins in 'Glacier', and potentially more old stuff we don't know about. It is, then, with some excitement, that we can share the album description of Environment Five...
Following on from the themes of the first 4 Environments albums, Five explores the space / time / dimension that exists when we die. The moment of departure. It includes appearances from Daniel Pemberton (BAFTA nominated / Ivor Novello winning composer), Raven Bush (Syd Arthur) and Riz Maslen (Neotropic). The Environment series originally began as an archive of previously unreleased recordings but Environment Five features thirteen all new songs recorded in the first half of 2014.
So yes, confirmation that this is the new FSOL album. So that's a nice way to start the day. Also, this is the first time an album has been given an official description. Whilst both Lifeforms and Dead Cities had their concepts discussed in interviews, this time we have a definite theme: the space / time / dimension that exists when we die. This theme is very much explored in the tracklist, as listed below...
Disc: 1
1. Point Of Departure
2. Source Of Uncertainty
3. Image Of The Past
4. Beings Of Light
5. In Solitude We Are At Least Alone
6. Viewed From Below The Surface
Disc: 2
1. Somatosensory
2. Multiples
3. Dying While Being Held
4. Machines of the Subconscious
5. Dark and Lonely Waters
6. The Dust Settles
7. Moments Of Isolation
Despite both the vinyl and CD editions being listed as single disc editions, both feature a double disc tracklist. Given the knowledge that it's going to be a long album, it's likely that it's a single CD, double LP edition, and this tracklist is for the vinyl. There's a lot of potentially interesting stuff to read into the tracklisting... firstly, again, the theme. Unlike the previous Environments records, which have very much had vague descriptive titles ('North Arctic', 'The Empty Land', 'River Delta', etc.), here there's a definite sense of cohesion between the track names. Secondly, it's great to see the 'Viewed from...' series make a return after its absence on the previous volume. Lastly, no sign of the three titles we'd previously been supplied with: 'Five G' (from the Seafar teaser in early 2012); '******' and 'Strange Glare' from the FSOLDigital Sampler 2. It's possible that these have been renamed; it's equally possible that the 'first half of 2014' remark in the description is true, and this wholly new record replaces an earlier incarnation of the album - in which case, we'll probably see those tracks appear on a future Archive record.
