Click these to access clips, reviews etc. of these collaboratives:
Mathias Grassow & Jim Cole Leland Burr Bislama - Jim Cole & Alpha Wave Movement
Listen, Reviews, and Discography
Jim Cole & Spectral Voices
“Achingly poignant”
~ Bill Beck
“staggering
beauty
and nuance”
~ Brian
Bieniowski The Ambient
Review
“feeds the imagination”
~ M. Jeffrey Schmidt,
Massage Magazine

Coalescence
Spectral
Spiral Music 1 - 1997 - 73:13
9. Ocean Depths 10. Heartbeat to Avalon 11. Primeval Forest 12. Blue India
13. Shimmering Silhouettes 14. Nuage 15. Skylark 16. Sun Shower 17. Merge
18. Outback Shaman Fry 19. As Were the Ancients 20. Spreading the Breath
21. Coalescence
to buy or download Coalescence
Innertones
Spectral Spiral Music 6 - 2007 - 70:58
1. All Within Your Heart and Mind 2. Arches/Far Journeys 3. Spectral Winds, Inward Voices
4. Hear Earth 5. Arches 2 6. Once Upon The Playground
Go to the order page to buy or download Innertones
Click here for an interview about Innertones
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Innertones is the fifth album of Jim Cole & Spectral Voices’ overtone singing and spans works from 1994-2005. It contains three Spectral Voices pieces recorded in a vast, reverberant water tower (like on their debut Coalescence and follow up Sky) and 3 more recent group and solo recordings from the Gathering Room. "...the
sound of a very personal gnosis, the kind of spiritual leavening that,
once glimpsed into, reveals itself to be deep and vast....These Innertones
capture a sense of the eternal, somehow, as only the best of ambient
music can. This stolen glimpse into an oceanic landscape, foreign and
seductive and familiar, is a place that we will never truly know in its
entirety....I think you’ll find that these ghostly inner
journeys are no less sweet in spite of their tantalizing ephemerality." ~ Brian Bieniowski - Innertones liner notes
Some reviews of Innertones: Jim Cole's harmonic overtone singing is both sublime and powerful. It is amazing to realize that all the sounds on this CD were created with the human voice. You'd swear you are hearing a full symphony of electronic instruments and choirs, but yet it is indeed the hidden power of this singular voice as revealed by Cole (and on four pieces two other singers join him). Overtone singing, a vocal technique from Asia, allows one voice to create several sounds simultaneously that blend in very engaging and ethereal ways. Over the course of several albums, Cole has refined his craft into a dynamic and heartfelt musical language all his own. Innertones is the sublime soundtrack music of our time, perfect for quiet contemplation, meditation, artistic inspiration, and trips to the stars.
~ Christopher Cameron, former radio host "Music of the Spheres";
electronic composer, Thought
Guild
Jim Cole + Spectral Voices create intimate Ambient Music by the simplest means. Using only their voices and both natural reverberation and a few electronic effects, this ensemble produces powerful soundscapes drawn from a deep interior silence. The CD Innertones (71'14") compiles six pieces from various points in the evolution of this unique vocal group. Every track has its own character and energy. From joyous and celebratory to minimalistic and ceremonial, Innertones aspires to the highest levels of human expression....Waves of sound resonate beyond the individual parts to create voice-filled ethereal sound structures. Both chilling and glorious, the whistling overtones that characterize this singing style magically materialize in the swirling atmosphere above the sustaining bass and mid-range lines. A fragile apparitional sound, this mystical second tone above the root note comes from just one singer - and provides a deeply profound listening experience.
There is music that you listen to, and there is music that you exist within. Innertones, from Jim Cole & Spectral Voices, is an example of the latter—music that peacefully and completely surrounds and envelops you. From the first soft note there is an air of sanctity and sanctuary, and that feeling pervades the entire disk....Between the pitch-perfect harmonies, the graceful pace of the songs, the intriguing textures of polyphonic singing, and the natural resonance and sustain of the water tower, Innertones develops, across its course, into something akin to a meditative mass for the ambient believers. The sound falls perfectly between hymn and chant....In headphones the full richness of the sounds truly comes through—deep throat-sung bass rumbles, angelic highs that spiral toward the top of the tower, lingering echoes twisting easily into each other in the air....While there are six distinct pieces here, Innertones is a singular experience that needs to considered in its peaceful entirety. You simply must come and exist within it, just for a while, to understand how unique and moving it is. Innertones is a Hypnagogue Highly Recommended CD.
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And now, an interlude:
Jim throat singing on Mawwal's latest
"Structural Adjustment" - Jim singing harmonic
overtone melodies with the
progressive rock group Paranoise.

The Way Beyond
Spectral Spiral Music 5 - 2003
A 73:39 long-form piece with 12 seamless tracks
Six and Seven One Eight Five Twelve Nine
to buy or download The Way Beyond
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Every remarkable sound on the 70+ minute continuous piece is sourced by his voice. Quiet, calming, and meditative; deeply textured and sublime. Achingly poignant. ~ Bill Beck, Spacemusic group list
Emotionally charged, meditative and just beautiful. Also the pace of the album is just perfect, moving from dense to open space with just the right amount of beauty, tension and emotion.
....While each cut on the disc has a separate mood or tone, The Way Beyond must be considered as a massive, undulating, living, breathing ambient zone of stillness and, unusually, simultaneous constant change and transition. While the basis of this recording is layered drones comprised solely from Cole's harmonic singing, these layers are overlapped with constantly changing sonic waves and patterns which create the feeling of watching a rushing brook; all motion and churning fluid on top, but a deep, peaceful stillness beneath. ....At around track nine, for example, the deep tones of Cole's voice expand and contract in an almost psychedelic flux, as if one is buffeted upon solar winds....This is inner space music in the highest sense of the term. Cole's seemingly plaintive cries strike as melancholy in track ten, but they are at the same time hopeful. ....Jim Cole, armed with only looped drones created from his own voice, has somehow unlocked a secret place within just by creating music....This wordless music, without connotation, has the power to unearth nameless spiritual delight within. There is no question--The Way Beyond is holy music, no matter what your persuasion--it is ageless, and always a valid and enriching experience. As with Godspace (and I believe that The Way Beyond surpasses its predecessor in terms of breadth and sonic diversity from the same essential sound sources), I find the music herein to be unquestionably one of the finest ambient/atmospheric releases of 2003. This is the kind of music that reminds of why one became an appreciator of the genre in the first place--it makes you feel good, larger than yourself, and, most of all, connected to the artist and music in some way that is difficult to describe with words that always seem clumsy by comparison. This disc goes “way beyond” Godspace, and that's really saying something. The Way Beyond gets my highest recommendation: it's paradigm shattering work by one of the brightest lights in today's ambient scene. ~ Brian Bieniowski, The Ambient Review
...The recording is drenched in reverb, which adds to the sensation of vastness that the listener feels. As the music expands, Cole sustains tones longer and begins to slide around the notes to nice effect. Gradually, as the music continues, Cole takes us to spaces not normally visited by conventional means. He is able to produce fugal or contrapuntal improvisations that sound very modal and harmonious yet completely different from normal western harmony. As a result, the music seems to transport us to a shimmering, yet stable place. Meanwhile, the drones over which he is improvising continue to shift and build, a very orchestral effect. At times they fade or even disappear completely, always to return to great effect. ~ Mark Morton, Ambient Visions
Jim employs a stunning array of sounds, such as walls of synthesizers, didgeridoo, flutes, accordion, cello, vocal choirs, and many heavenly sounds the listener has never heard before. The amazing thing is all of these sounds are performed...with only his voice, using reverb and looping, "live on the fly"! He has collaborated and worked with Alpha Wave Movement, Vidna Obmana, Steve Roach, Mathias Grassow and more, plus several solo albums and releases with groups Spectral Voices and Leland Burr. His signature sound uses harmonic overtone singing and subfundamental chant to create a distinctive and spiritual listening experience. ....There are deep drones and soaring, sustained notes that conjure up
primal feelings of wonder and awe. Careful listening will reveal
fascinating textures in these beatless landscapes. Tens of thousands of
years of metaphysical experience are contained in this timeless work....The performances are spellbinding and the sound
quality is excellent. This is music that enriches and replenishes the spirit. A
must for any ambient or space music collection, this is a great disc for
meditation, contemplation, yoga or inner journeys!
Imagine a very beautiful
and haunting sound, filled with voices and echoes overlaying and blending,
bending, growing and decaying, drifting freely in some inner or outer space, and
one might have some insight as to where Godspace and The Way Beyond
are musically situated. This is spiritual ambient drone music of the highest
order....he is able to create these intensely beautiful and mystifying
sonic edifices that are at once hypnotic, soothing and transcendent... |
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The Way Beyond Live: Click here for a video clip of the "Interstellar Vistas" section of The Way Beyond live - Jim's 8/1/04 concert. All of these sounds are Jim's voice - the layers are him looping his overtone voice live. "Phasing Into Another Realm" (The Way Beyond live) Special thanks to Joyce St. Germaine and all the crew on "The Sacred Journey" program that produced the video from which these clips originate. |

Godspace
Spectral Spiral Music 4 - 2002 - 73:47
1. Astral (subsections: Perseverance, Rapt Bliss, & Wandering through Star Fields)
2. Light Shines In Your Heart * (subsections: A Wishing Thing, Pendent Hope, & So you know I'm with You)
3. Transformations (subsections: Thanatos, Breathing into Life, & Deliquescent Being)
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* "Light Shines in your Heart" is dedicated to my daughter Emily, who at 4 gave me a pendant she made of paper, tiny seashells, sequins, rainbow marker colors and such. She had sensed I was feeling blue one night before going to a gig, so she handed me her treasure. I asked her what it was and she replied: "It's a wishing thing...when you wish for things light shines in your heart, so you know I'm with you." I wore it that night and have worn it many times since.
...Godspace showcases the pure wonder that is born of genius when it's wedded to technical skill of staggering proportion. ...["Astral"] unfolds so gradually in wave after wave of beauty and bliss. The music is like slowly and effortlessly gliding over a rolling landscape with the glow of soft purple light from a setting sun bathing you and the land below. ...color me impressed, blown-away, and mystified. Highly recommended, obviously! ~ Bill Binkelman, Wind and Wire
...some of the most superlative ambient music I've ever heard. It is a work of staggering beauty and nuance, at once improvisational and composed. This disc has such an emotional and spiritual resonance for me; it is as if Cole had tapped into my biorhythms for 74 minutes, occupying my thoughts, and impregnating all activity around me with meaning where before there seemed to be none. This is timeless, important music, and I give it my highest recommendation. ~ Brian Bieniowski, The Ambient Review
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Sky
Spectral
Spiral Music 2 - 2000 - 57:26
1. For the Birds 2. From the Birds 3. Kyrie Eleison
4. Passion 5. Uplifting 6. Spacious Sighs 7. Know Way (Way)
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...Spacious, floating, and ethereal, the combined human voices seem to stretch out and envelop everything, blanketing it in a layer of billowy softness. The wonder and awe of "Kyrie Eleison," the "I swear this is a synthesizer" effects on "Passion" and the blissful ambient-like "Uplifting" are songs that should send fans of electronic ambient music into a state of rapture....That it's human voices making these celestial sounds never fails to astonish me. ~ Bill Binkelman, Wind and Wire ...I'm still amazed that these sounds are simply untreated voices... of course, they're overtone singing within a large space, and the results are simultaneously thrilling and soothing. Lush, diffuse choral strands rise and fall with Kyrie Eleison's continually surging vocal drifts. Ever-expanding layers seem to trace a distant, gently meandering shoreline in human-powered tones that no synthesizer could hope to mimic. ~David Opdyke, Ambientrance
... a sound extreme in both beauty and emotional character....Sky will have the listener returning many times, attempting to both re-enter the zone this music puts one in and quantify an immeasurable factor that borders on the mystical. |
Gathering
Room Spectral
Voices' Story