Mountain of Memory’s 14 free-flowing tracks effortlessly encapsulate his entire musical history without sounding forced or overly complicated: Mid-tempo dance grooves, solid boom bap hip-hop beats and calm, reflective tempos blend with electric and acoustic guitars, classical violin, Persian dilruba, cimbaloms, finger snaps, symphonic strings, bubbling water, Latin and African hand drumming, music boxes, Baroque flutes and opera singers, who add unexpected vocal ornamentations to accent certain melodic phrases. Underlying it all, is the bed of sound Appling produces using electric pianos, ethereal synthesizer washes, processed and almost inaudible vocals, soothing ambient textures and the pulsing of an infinite heartbeat produced by electronic bass tones.
