It’s been four years since Ulrich Schnauss released A Strangely Isolated Place (Domino), ambient downtempo’s answer to lush, shoegaze music, but despite a lack of output during this time, the German producer hasn’t been idle. Rather, a move from Berlin back to his hometown of Kiel gave Schnauss the isolation needed to focus on work and reinvent his trademark sound for his latest release, Goodbye.

Beats and textures on A Strangely Isolated Place were both rich and repetitive. Goodbye includes a layer of vocals over sweeping arpeggios and melodies, and also features up to 100 separate musical layers during various parts of the album. Schnauss, it seems, got to know Abelton Live pretty well during his self-imposed seclusion, and Goodbye also proves it’s possible to spend three years making a blissed-out masterpiece without putting record companies out of business.

Goodbye is out July 10, 2007 on Domino.

Tracklisting
1. Never Be the Same
2. Shine
3. Stars
4. Einfeld
5. In Between the Years
6. Here Today, Gone Tomorrow
7. A Song About Hope
8. Medusa
9. Goodbye
10. For Good