We’re given a look into Sam Mehran’s world of drone. Personally I’m a bit more familiar with his Outer Limits Recordings and Matrix Metals. Here we get to see how exactly he arranges an otherworldly drone. Despite occasional flashes of pure genius, it tends to have too many dramatic transitions without any real rhyme or reason. Usually with drone pieces there’s a greater tendency to smooth these out. But Explorer’s failure to do so is not its only problem.
A lot of these ideas in general sound too familiar to a poor man’s James Ferraro. James Ferraro does some great otherworldly drone, in a similar vein. While James’ stuff works for the most part (obviously there are dullards there) here Sam’s stuff doesn’t seem as far out there as he would think.
Side A has “We Thrive Off The Encantic Dance Of Orbs”. I’m not going to judge how good or bad the title is, but the song is disjointed. Great ideas are touched upon, but by him moving around too much, it feels aimless rather than transcendent. “That Beneath Of Realms Fermenting” part II of the sentence is much better. Here he focuses on having the drone evolve less suddenly and more organically. Using less abrupt transitions and generally better ideas helps it out.
Overall, this could have been better. Moments exist which point to a potential for greater things, but it is a bit of a letdown.