Yui Onodera & Arovane: stillform
Affin

Handsomely presented in a six-panel digipak, stillform brings together two long-standing members of the ambient-electronic community in Yui Onodera and Arovane. Nine sequentially numbered “form” tracks appear on the set, each differentiating itself from the next yet all exemplifying the qualities one familiar with the artists would expect: immaculate sound design, fastidious attention to detail, and atmosphere and texture prominent focal points.

Recorded between 2020 and '25 and the collaboration effected between Uwe Zahn and Onodera from their respective Halle and Tokyo outposts, stillform finds the sonic architects using synthesizers, field recordings, found objects, and audio processing to craft the compact soundscapes. Their reputations precede them, of course, Onodera a respected composer and sound artist whose background in architectural acoustics informs his creative practice and Zahn a major player since the ‘90s in the areas of experimental electronica, ambient, and IDM. The coupling of Onodera's spatial sensitivity with Zahn's sleek sound design makes for absorbing listening. Their evocations carve out meditative spaces for the listener to enter into for two to four minutes at a time.

A pastoral exercise in ambient electronica, the opening “form” lulls with gently shimmering tones sprinkled with acoustic piano and flickering electronics. Zahn's fingerprints are all over the second in its warm undulating flow and in the ninth in its synthesizer timbres. The fourth weaves a drone dimension into its presentation via harmonium-like tones, the setting over quickly at two minutes but one that could conceivably have been extended much longer. Whereas a gauzy tone loops during the fifth to intensify its hypnotic effect, the sixth enters in a swirling wave before crystallizing into a hazy vision speckled with chimes and other percussive details. Rare for this release, the seventh is animated by an insistent pulse, though the textural array of tones, washes, and flourishes is as abundant as it is elsewhere.

May 2026