Jonathan Lee (aka Anduin) has made one of the most interesting records that I came across this year, an 8-track album called “Stolen Years”. Imagine sampled atmospheric music with gentle saxophone sounds and delicate synth layers being played in a room with a view. In times dark and nostalgic, it’s somehow a concept album. Not in a way of exploring a specific theme, but in a sense that you are free to set the scene for whatever you want to and just give in to its flow. It’s modern meditation. If it was possible to find yourself in a quiet previously-abandoned building that would be comforting to live in, preferably in the countryside but still somehow connected to the city’s lonesome walks at night, “Stolen Years” would probably be it. Meant to be played and listened as a guided sequence of sound and subliminal image synthesis, Anduin has created his album of frustration. In August 2011, Jonathan lost the majority of the files and gear in a home burglary. Using whatever was left from the past two years of exploration and with the contribution of saxophonist Jimmy Ghaphery, he managed to befriend the shadows and the gloominess and turned them into a sonorous purification of a current state of mind.
