Label: Virtual
Released: 2006

01. Vale
02. Elvish Tea
03. Utoia
04. Luminessence
05. Aeolian Woods
06. Mozaic Rain
07. Sunshine Windmill
08. Mycelium Dawn
09. Sycamore Breeze
10. Cyantium Flower
11. Summerset Hill
12. Autumn Leaves
13. Awaken

Elve is the another, after Ishvara, side-project by British composer Matt Hillier, known mainly as Ishq, who presents his album in his own label named Virtual. The discs of this label are released in limited editions of 500 copies. The first album in the series was "Magik Square Of The Sun" which premiere was in 2005. "Infinite Garden" is the CD released one year later. As we could expect - new incarnation of this artist brings us new sound in borders of his constant and sophisticated thought.

This 66-minutes album contain thirteen tracks of very diversity length. The first one lasts thirteen minutes and a half, the third one - ten minutes, the shortest track (number nine) lasts over one minute. Quite a lot garden sounds we have in this album, for example birds samples - that Hillier so much cherish. But I mean also this kind of sounds that Hillier was able to transform in the image of the nature. For example "Mozaic Rain" is a composition really like a rain - the melodies created on sprinkle picture side by side with the real samples of rain are unbelievably endearing. But from this all I am impressed especially by "Summerset Hill", because its stability allow to enter into the other, the most abstract dimension. Paradox of this is that composition is very, very thriftily builded. The point is that on this stage of the album it's exhilarate with its stoical, what also makes next two, last tracks of this CD. What before? The most spectacular arrangement example we have in "Utoia" - psychedelic and epic composition which river of sounds practically finish in "Aeolian Woods". If we can of course term of "epic" give back well to describe ambient, then we have it in compartment of above-mentioned tracks.

Minimalism is a characteristic of Elve, other elements are solid for Virtual: total ambient, very deep, very difficult to define. "Infinite Garden", in my feel, is the CD that demand more from the listener than Ishvara's album. And undoubtedly the biggest difference in view of the sounds is that structures from here call oneself as depths of the nature, while "Magik Square Of The Sun" is a landscape of crystalline... "Infinite Garden" is another masterpiece of ambient, certificate of Matthew Hillier's genius.