Norihito Suda’s “Light Snowfall” is ten minutes of soft pads. There are organ-like notes that take forever to fade, and gentle vocal-oid choral effects throughout, and strums that bring to mind an acoustic guitar, though the mental image of the latter lasts longer than does the sound’s actual presence. At times there’s a tremulous quality, when the inner functions of a waveform briefly let slip a quiet fury of activity. There’s no structure to “Light Snowfall,” nor structural give and take, just a fade in and a fade out and the steady stream in between. But don’t mistake it for a drone; it’s more of a composite than a drone, more an assemblage than a singularity. At ten minutes it’s also anything but fleeting. It seems to hold time in place, a suggestion reinforced by an occasional sense of a light ticking, like a clock is being turned back on itself, pushing for time to resume.
Track originally published at soundcloud.com/norihitosuda. More from Suda, who is based in Kyoto, Japan, at norihitosuda.bandcamp.com.