Glow Serene by Julie Hill (Independent)

Julie Hill
Glow Serene
Independent

It’s been a moment since I have had an ambient album hit me this hard. Julie Hill’s Glow Serene is as calm as it is fluid as it is universal as it is personal.

From the beginning, you are enticed into a meditation of space and time. Technology, nature, and creativity conjoin into a blissful state that is just beautiful to experience. The song gives you pause and the space to simply appreciate.

From the beeps and the boops of the title track, Hill spins you into a space of delicate 1970s electronic impressionism ala Suzanne Ciani (comparably the brilliant “Seven Waves”). There are further hints with “An Ether and Time.” Here, Hill lends her voice like a longing chant for distant memories, “I want to hold you — hold you.” Like memories often do, they become washed out by a greater force. Here, it’s nature as Hill builds a soft reflection space.

I love Hill’s clarity. At any time there are no convolutions to blur the meanings of what a song like “Ambient Bliss” is trying to convey. Through gentle movement, self-reflection, and sounds as intentional as a deep breath, Hill releases us into the universe—even if that universe is embedded in the mind. Hill describes part of the philosophy behind the album is through inspiration from her grandmother and how she deals with life’s pain through autonoetic consciousness, the human ability to mentally place oneself in the past and future (mental time travel) or in counterfactual situations (alternative outcomes) and thus be able to examine one’s own thoughts.

The album is designed to be an alternate reality, an escape of what daily life sucks us into. Glow Serene is guided by each song and song title (if collected together, it forms a poetic roadmap). The album as a whole is pure brilliance.