Dark | Electro-acoustic | Avant-garde. This rhythmic, mid-tempo track depicts a mysterious urban environment without using dance beats or conventional drums. Hints of glitch and sparse percussion rise above a wash of atmospheric electronica and driving bass.

Zoan

Electro-lounge | Relaxing urban feel | Downtempo. Soft, ambient opening evolves until beats and bass reach full pace at 1:53. Atmospheric synth vibes are punctuated by casual plucked string soloing and glitchy percussion.

Raatuq

Melodic | Soundscape | New Age feel. A hypnotic and mysterious melody opens this quiet, melancholy piece. Sparse percussion, acoustic elements, and vintage electronic accents are woven into the relaxed, reflective pace.

First Ones

Dark | Soundtrack | Electro-acoustic. The melodic, avant-garde sound of a late-night alien metropolis, with an “active” dark ambient feel. Expansive soundscapes and headphone-friendly dimensionality fill the soundstage with darkness, solitude, and mystery. Featuring sub-bass passages, sine electronics, glitch elements, and sparse ethnic percussion and instrumentation.

Sysisys

My goal is to fuse the traditional and the new, the pastoral and the
urban, the primitive and futuristic. This track was inspired by some of
the early pioneers of electronic music such as Tangerine Dream and Brian
Eno, but contains acoustic ethno-ambient atmospheres and wave-style
bass. I love the way these elements combine and create a fresh, textured
ambient sound.

Rusticine

Anguis is an experimental long-format ambient track filled with other-worldly atmospherics, ethnic percussion, and swirling electronics. This piece evolves through several stages that vary from bold orchestration to subdued, contemplative synthesis. Devoid of droning minimalism and endless space-music reverb, this is more of an "art piece" designed to keep the listener engaged.

Anguis

This track’s thoughtful, lyrical ambience offers respite, reflection, and solace. Classic electronic motifs are woven into washes of airy, translucent instrumentation; the resulting atmosphere offers the listener an opportunity to take a deep aural and mental breath. Interhalation was created specifically as an intermission piece. It is positioned in the very center of the VARIANT album, flanked on either side by longer, darker, more complex tracks.

Interhalation

A dark, epic track that builds, releases, breaths, rebuilds. Filled with ambient heavy bass glides, acoustic ethnic percussion, and layer upon layer of synthesis, this song captures a feeling of classical "cosmic terror" and transcendence.

Altum Deep

VARIANT

Tenebrion

Viridian is an ambient electronic journey through a lush, green, fantastical landscape. Gentle techno motifs and light hand percussion ultimately encounter a moss and orchid-covered faerie spring – which was actually discovered high in the Cascade mountains and recorded by the artist while hiking.

Viridian

A brave, dark strain of ethereal instrumental electronic music wafts from a former chicken breeding warehouse in the wee hours of the morning. Inside the downtown Bellingham, Washington compound, composer/producer Bryan Hughes labors over his latest works in a modest, uncluttered art studio space. He’s an artist who has hit that elusive creative milestone of garnering prime industry acclaim and accolades from a fiercely original music that defies genre classification.

Since 2002, Bryan, under the AeTopus moniker, has released six albums and two EPs. AeTopus’s artistic continuum stretches from a traditional new-age pop approach to the minor-key moodiness and elongated song structures characterized by his most recent work. The project has won a Zone Music Reporter Award for Best Electronic album, earned three ZMR Best Electronic album nominations, and garnered one nomination for the NAR Lifestyle Music Awards for Best Electronic album. Despite this acclaim in the new age marketplace, AeTopus music doesn’t conform to the radio-oriented format—a more apt description of its genre might be “electronic instrumental goth.”

AeTopus compositions feature the drama and overture of classical music and film soundtracks, the ambience and experimentation of pre-Ableton electronica, the aggression of hard rock, and the mystical majesty of world music. The tracks are shadowy, emotive, and rife with intrigue without being specifically thematic. The overall effect of AeTopus songs is disquieting, which puts it at odds with most of the meditative or relaxing music that populates the new age genre.

Bryan’s current pair of releases, the full-length VARIANT, and its bass-heavy companion EP, Deep Variants, signal a fresh era of intrepid creativity. The compositions here are akin to sonic essays that feature loose melodic narratives. These tracks breathe, and feature delicate dynamic shifts and, at times, ominous ethereal textures. “My goal was to apply my existing musical instincts to longer-format pieces, and to not feel confined by my long-standing bite-sized, radio-friendly style,” Bryan shares. The EP Deep Variants powerfully reimagines the VARIANT source songs with a haunting low-end quality.

Today, Bryan plans to continue his musical voyage exploring more sublime and eccentric long-form compositions. “I think most serious creative people like to see evolution in their work. I've learned to let go of the expectations that come from being associated with a genre, or that come from having established a certain sound on past albums. When I give myself that permission to experiment, those darker and grittier influences find a way to sneak back into the mix.”

- Lorne Behrman

AeTopus

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