Gaia Mattiuzzi - Inner Core [Aut Records 085]

Another fresh one released via Aut Records on November 11th, 2k22 is "Inner Core", the latest album conceived by Italian vocalist Gaia Matiuzzi with the support of an international set of artists, most famously - at least for an electronic audience - Grischa Lichtenberger who contributed electronic sounds as well as production on "Winds Of May (0517_05_re0417_03)". Over the course of seven pieces and a total playtime of roughly 39 minutes Gaia Mattiuzzi opens with the touching, emotional and tender piano meets vocal amalgamation that is "Calyx", a beautiful contemporary tribute to the sepia sound of crackly vintage days with the subsequent piece "The Way Of Memories" entering a livelier, more dramatic widescreen Jazz realm before "About The End" presents beautiful, meandering, ever intensifying piano lines with a proper late night aesthetic and the ethereal, enchanting "From Dewy Dreams" sees Gaia Mattiuzi making full use of her chiming and bell-like vocal register in a way that would be well suitable for future Film Noir experiments. Furthermore "The Last Flower In My Hair" incorporates captivating Electronica rhythms in a calm and jazzy, albeit almost Björk'esque fashion, "Riding A Photon" comes across way more tempered and restrained than one would expect travelling at the actual speed of light and the concluding aforementioned "Winds Of May (0517_05_re0417_03)" seems to aim for an almost solo'esque vocal approach atop hyperminimalist fragmented electronics for the first half of the cut before a few stripped down tenor sax and piano fragments provide an additional human, and naturally Jazz-flavored, touch. File under: high quality Jazz sounds which should make their way into every contemporary genre collection for a reason.