Robert Miles was once bigger than sliced bread...then as things went the world pretty much forgot about him. Long before the blogosphere chewed and spit out artists, the eletronic music scene was doing it. You're only as popular as your next big break down and if it fails then say hello to obscurity. While I'm not really sure if that happened to Robert Miles, I do remember selling boat loads of his records in 1995-96 and then never seeing or hearing from him again. Until now.
Back with a new album entitled Th1rt3en, the album sees him weaving together a tapestry of ambient atmospherics and jazzy percussion. A four to the four dance music record this is not, but rather an exploratory electronic album that occupies some space somewhere between Bill Nelson, Brian Eno, and maybe even Robert Fripp. Th1rt3en is an intriguing mysterious record that subtly mixes sounds together to create a mystical world that your ears and imagination can get lost in. This is music for dark rooms and empty spaces; it's the sort of thing that haunts your soul while chilling your mind out.
Th1rt3en is gorgeous lush stuff that's minimal usage of everything makes the record hypnotizing. This level of nominal instrumentation gives his songs room to breathe and branch out in all sorts of directions and it does just that over the course of each of the thirteen songs here. Th1rt3en is far from "Children," as you could ever hope and truly shows that Robert Miles is an artist that puts his music and creativity above all else. Th1rt3en is an impressive record that's expansive and beautiful. It's not a dance record but rather an album that is in its own little world and only too happy to be there. After listening to Th1rt3en I suspect that many people will want to be in that little world as well.
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