TimeDog – The Fragile Present

TimeDog is a moniker of multi-instrumentalist and experimental composer Pete Burton. His music is an organic and personal journey. Improvisation and long live takes are critical for his sound as a means to translate aspects of the human condition as directly as possible. The variation and diversity in themes and styles found throughout this album is a direct result of this compositional process. His music is largely made in his Glasgow based studio on a variety of hardware analogue and digital synthesizers, guitars, piano and a multitude of percussion instruments with field recordings also woven into some of his pieces.

The opener takes the listener into a digital dreamscape, improvised in one take, leading us into the epic ambient excursion of “The Pilgrimage”. The music then darkens in mood with the bowed guitar-driven “Ancient Tales” brooding ominously before a shower of hailstorms marks the begining of “Fear of Change”, a Cage inspired avant-garde bed of chaotic percussion traversing through haunting piano structures (recorded in the piano carrells of a local library). “The Gateway” offers us exactly that, through its guitar-led, poignant melody we find ourselves bathed in the warmth of “Beyond Love”. From there the album leads us through multiple dimensions of sound including the wall of percussion in “Let Them In”, the melancholic looped field recordings of “Conversations”, the counterpoint guitars in “Counters” and the drones of “Soul Mother”. Finally we’re back in the piano room with a delicate and beautiful piece that reminds us that our presence in the present is always fragile.