Watch your step.

The Mechanics of Mysticism | artist: Ether Diver — An ambitious bit of occasionally abstract electronica mashed up with bouncing rhythms, The Mechanics of Mysticism proposes to be the preliminary results of an effort "to catalog the techniques, tools and technology of direct experience of the divine". Like I said, ambitious.

The result? Well, in someways it's analogous to the psychogeographic work of those handful of electronic producers working over imaginary scenarios in the pastoral plane. But whereas much of that work seeks to place the listener in a state (even in a defined place), Ether Diver's work seems more to begin in a state and then encourage you to reach out beyond it. The means, however feel more structured than purely psychedelic. And throughout most of these tracks there is that bounce. I like to think of it as not the monotonous up and down bouncing of a festival crowd, but the bouncing of a pliant rubber ball down a brick pathway and long set of stairs. The more you try to catch up with it, the more likely you are to lose your footing. Making it all that much more necessary to watch your step — to keep yourself aware, lithe, balanced. And maybe that is what Ether Diver is getting at with these proposed techniques, tools, and technologies of direct experience. | 3.25 out of 5 stars.