Eluvium – “Escapement” & “Swift Automatons”

For nearly 20 years, the Portland composer Matthew Robert Cooper has been recording gorgeously acoustic ambient music under the name Eluvium. Early next year, Cooper will follow his last two Eluvium albums, 2020’s Virga I and 2021’s Virga II, with the new LP (Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality. That new Eluvium album is inspired by the works of TS Eliot and Richard Brautigan and also by the way that algorithms regulate humankind’s interactions with machines. Cooper recorded the album with a number of different musicians, including a full orchestra, working with them all remotely.

Today, Cooper has shared two tracks from the LP. “Escapement” is a short introductory track, a kind of throat-clearing. “Swift Automatons” is a bright, cheery instrumental with a busy string figure. It sounds a whole lot more active and less contemplative than what I’m used to hearing from Eluvium, though I can’t front like I know that catalog backwards and forwards. Below, check out both tracks and the (Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality tracklist.

TRACKLIST:
01 “Escapement”
02 “Swift Automatons”
03 “Vibration Consensus Reality (for Spectral Multiband Resonator)”
04 “Scatterbrains”
05 “Phantasia Telephonics”
06 “The Violet Light”
07 “Void Manifest”
08 “Clockwork Fables”
09 “Mass Lossless Interbeing”
10 “A Floating World of Demons”
11 “Endless Flower”

(Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality is out 5/12 on Temporary Residence.