Pathei Mathos means “learn a lesson,” but more literally it refers to “learning through suffering.” Valerio Marras, through his project S A R R A M, takes this phraseology explicitly from Aeschylus’ tragedy Agamemnon, where, in an exposition full of powerful dramatic irony and foreshadowing, the chorus describes this essential component of wisdom to which humans are subjected. The concept of knowledge resulting from and culminating in suffering is arguably a core concept of Greek tragedy. And it’s also a part of life, which Marras aims to convey by channeling his experiences and emotions through Pathei Mathos’ ambient soundscapes. An artist claiming their art to be deeply personal is nothing new; it’s the norm. Therefore, this comment is only notable when the music either really does or really doesn’t carry the weight it’s supposed to—emotional, conceptual, and otherwise.
As a genre-fluid album of experimental, instrumental, semi-electronic, ambient drone, Pathei Mathos was set up to be faceless, even heartless. Perhaps interesting, and pleasant, but something you let fade into the background. Against all odds, this album is not just engaging, but moving. While it does possess that intangible quality that allows it to form an effective backdrop for daydreaming, if one so chooses, it is intense, emotionally vulnerable, and beautiful, such that it pulls the listener back, to pay attention. The elegiac, haunting female vocals that ring out, often wordlessly over pulsating feedback (title track), or chant in dissonant harmony (“Korimai”) are the only voices.1 These go a long way towards impressing the heavy pathos of the record. But the music itself, mostly devoid of any voice at all, says the most, thanks to the driving force of S A R R A M’s intelligent composition. Tracks blend seamlessly into one another to the extent that it’s frequently impossible to correctly judge where one ends and another begins. Rather than dissolving the whole into a forgettable mass of sound, this elevates the immersion. You don’t notice that songs have slipped past not because it all sounds the same, but because the music has evolved so naturally, you didn’t think to check.
The emotions that Pathei Mathos expresses are felt tangibly because of how well S A R R A M handles every element. The melodies are beautiful, with layers of synth, cello, zither, salterio, and guitar languorously swelling and ebbing in mournful patterns (“Lotus Quest,” “Slow Care, Heavy Wires,” “Long Live, Farewell”). Sometimes this poignancy of strings and piano is reminiscent of the softer side of recent Panopticon, with all its stirring sadness. A persistent echo adds a soft grace and powerful atmosphere to plucks and shimmering refrains, recalling the stillest sensibilities of Dream Unending (“Calma”), or the most graceful of Unreqvited’s (“Lotus Quest”, “Long Live, Farewell”). Marras plays with sound levels too, feedback, vocals, and instruments alike crescendoing and diminuendoing like ocean waves, a throbbing bass building to almost overwhelming loudness before falling back down (title track, “Zarola,” “Slow Care…”). The whole thing has a cinematic feel, due to its uncanny ability to shapeshift through layers and tones, and communicate deeply without ever overtly impressing itself upon the listener. This could be, in theory, a soundtrack to an interpretation of that classical tragedy, “Korimai”‘s unsettling looped psychedelia narrating a devastating dysphoria of denouement that descends into woe with deceptively simple, reverberating post-metal chords.
There will be those for whom this album simply is not made—those with no sympathy whatsoever for ambient or instrumental music—that is true for any musical work. But as someone who otherwise spends most of their listening time with artists of far less subtle and gentle natures, Pathei Mathos subverted and exceeded any expectations I had. Owing to its emotional and musical depth, it is incredibly immersive, such that time and again, it induces you to press play. You’re not quite sure how you got from the mystical plucking and dense noise of “A Floating Sun,” to the string-led elegy of “Lotus Quest.” Or from there to the anxiety-ridden drama of “Korimai.” Or there again to the tear-jerking pulchritude of “Long Live…” But you want to go again. Or I did anyway.
All the above being said, Pathei Mathos remains a humble ambient album that will certainly not touch everyone, or even many, as it did me. But it does feel personal and says a lot, even at its most apparently understated. Fittingly, it drips with pathos—feeling, or most literally, suffering—the very thing its title professes. How much more, really, could S A R R A M do?
Rating: Very Good
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Subsound Records
Website: sarram.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/sarramproject
Releases Worldwide: September 1st, 2023
