“His album… outstanding. One of the prolific producers, what this scene needs.”
- Goldie
This album is more than Drum and Bass, it’s more than music, this album is a fictional narrative “interpreted into music and depicted in photography”. The album rolls on like one endless track. A Wondering Journal is funnily enough is a journal, however this journal has no words, it’s a story told through sounds and pictures. The physical copies of the record (which are available on two disc CD and Vinyl formats) include a collect of 52 photographs which work in unison with the tracks to document this intrepid journey. The digital version of the album comes with 15 photographs one for each track.
You are never fully aware of where one track ends and where one beginnings, however listening to the changing time signatures and different sounds of each track, changes the feelings omitted, and just as in life, there a no breaks, no time for 30 seconds of silence, just like these tracks emotions and experiences in life merge into one another before you’ve really had time to understand them. As with all art, it’s all open to interpretation, but this is what I heard in the story.
‘Day One’ starts the journey with a taxi and a mysterious phone call, the filmic interlude runs into ‘The Intrepid’. This track is true to Sabre’s individual style, deep, dark and melancholic this tracks sets the vibe for the rest of the album. An ever-changing array of weird and wonderful noises creep round the staple backdrop of dark beats and a deep omnipresent sub, which creates a feeling of exploring the unknown.
Next comes ‘Quarters’ the albums most energetic track. Sabre has teamed up with Niosia and Icicle to create this beauty. As one beat pounds hard, another shuffles along by beside and with the added eeriness of whirling backwards sounding snares. By day four the character has changed, seeing a different side of the world he speaks to a woman and decides to become an aid worker. Time passes and the journey continues, tracks like ‘Follow Polaris’ seem to quench a thirsty soul with throbbing bass, syncopated beats and sinister whispers, but suddenly and unexpectedly ‘Day Eight’ presents a terrifying situation as it reveals a terrible plane crash which has left four missing including our journals documenter.
‘Peril’ is a truly terrifying track, it creates an atmosphere of a race against death. As the plane first crashes the tune is full of adrenalin, but as night falls and the exotic sounds of the wilderness kick in it’s a possibility that the character may not be found. ‘Levelling Out Pt.1’shows our character’s struggle with his senses, he thinks he is going to die and his thoughts are projected to us as Maxell Golden raps in a poetic spoken word style, questioning life and all it presents to us, the deep, husky refrain of “stay calm” is like the conscience of our documenter urging him to hold on to the bitter end.
‘Have it your way’ is the masterpiece that it should be, with the ever faithful Alix Perez at his side, this track is a juxtaposition of chilling beauty. This is the point of the journey where our character is closest to death; he is falling in and out of consciousness, when finally in ‘Day Fourteen’ a helicopter comes to save him.
‘Havens Verge’ finishes the album on an uplifting high. As the beat shuffles by soft piano notes play along slightly out of time, creating a high gratifying felling of freedom, our hero is free, he has been rescued and pure euphoria pores through the track.
CD two is the club mix version of this concept album, proving that not only can Sabre create a stunning, expertly crafted, cinematic piece of artwork, but he hasn’t lost his touch in the world of clubs, faster, harder and more melodic this able completely mirrors the first. It’s not hard to see why Sabre is acclaimed not only by critics but also peers like, Niosia and Alix Perez and even legends like Goldie.
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