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Beyond the Horizon Line CD Album 2004 | Silber 034 10 tracks, 62 minutes $12 ($18 international, $5 download (256kbps, ~110 megs)) : Listen to track Echoes Of The Lost Sea : More info track listing: Deep in the Morning Sun, Echoes of the Lost Sea, Towards the Blinding Glare, The Call of the Horizon Line, Stellar Buckshot Awaits, Nightsky Illumination, Dark Gateway, Strange Star Transmissions, Stellar Shower Begins, Unsettled New Day

I usually enjoy some good soundscape, textured music. Thats pretty much what this is but it just didn't seem to go anywhere. Its definitely a soft mellow soundscape record with a lot of real interesting shifts in moods. Whether you're looking to relax put on a record and drift to sleep or rub some hummus on your nipples and meditate and experiment with some astral projection this album will definitely put you in that trancelike state. Not recommended if you want to stay awake though.
~ Eric Hernandez, The Bee's Knees

Abject fear and insanity have an inherent sound attached to them.  It’s a soft, foreboding, and quite ominous stream of musical abstracts that fires synapses in our brains, revving up core emotions.  Thus far, Lycia is the only band that has effectively sound-tracked those.  Mike VanPortfleet has gone a step further by creating the active audio component of dread and utter desperation, mainlining it directly into your soul.
I used to think, back in the 70s, that there existed no better expressway into fear than Tangerine Dream’s Stratosfear until I heard Lycia ’s hair-raising Cold.  Since then, Cold has become the sole audio expression of the bleakness of helpless existence.  A word of warning to the uninitiated, Lycia musical forays are terrifying to hear as they induce the very horror they explore.
In this solo issue, away from the influences of Lycia, VanPortfleet aptly walks through the nether regions of our corruptible humanity via minimalist pathways.  Beyond the Horizon Line begins with a steady flow of deep, synchronous chants and eerily enchanting banshee whisperings, interspersing with an industrial screech of metal.  There is no light in this world, only a feeling along for some sense of border, of which there is none.
The anger in this music is fierce, the threat of violence just beyond your field of vision.  There are tracks that are reminiscent of Tangerine Dream, especially  “Stellar Buckshot Awaits”, which reminds one of Ridley Scott’s Legend and its closing theme.  But where Legend exudes an ending of happiness, “Stellar Buckshot Awaits” runs a seemingly happy thread of music underneath an overwhelmingly frightening overlay.  What may seem a clash of emotions actually becomes a far more sinister run of music that will unnerve you.
Wind, metal, and darkness are the threads of this work.  The sound of the hot wind is relentless, rising and falling with the terror of Horizon Line’s world; the wind carrying with it the stinging industrial smells of metal on metal from some unknown mechanism of pain.  Track after track, you’re assaulted with crawling skin set to music.  Beyond the Horizon Line is an unyielding world of anguish, desperation, and a barrage of fear.
I’ve always considered VanPortfleet’s work with Lycia to be a travel through the silent and uncharted darkness of humanity. Whether that work is representational of humanity’s loneliness, its anger, its fears, its hatred, or a hybrid of all of them, Beyond the Horizon Line contains the essence of them all behind a curtain of music that barely shelters us from the horrors found past them.
Ten modular tracks, ten different journeys; Beyond the Horizon Line is filled with 60+ minutes of varying soundscapes. All of them will unsettle you.
~ Matt Rowe, Music Tap

For over a decade, Mike VanPortfleet and his band Lycia (of which he was often the sole member) explored the most desolate regions of goth industrial-ambient from the unlikely locale of Phoenix, Arizona. On his first solo record, VanPortfleet continues to craft quintessential night-time music; the only connection with his sun-baked hometown seems to be with the barrenness and stillness of its outskirts. Beyond the Horizon Line strips away Lycia's gaudier, more typically goth accents (the drum machines, the tortured poetics), leaving only a grazed wasteland of moaning loops and occasional guitar peals. Its massive length and lack of dynamics make it difficult to pay full attention throughout, but its finest moments echo masterworks like Stars of the Lid's The Ballasted Orchestra and Eno's Apollo. Some tracks, like the ponderous two-note wheeze of "Night Sky Illumination", drift too aimlessly for too long, but others, like "Echoes of the Lost Sea", vividly evoke the isolation and dread of open waters and empty urban warehouses. The excellent "Stellar Buckshot Awaits" stands apart with its icy, Slowdive-like guitar and almost-nothing vocals (the only such appearance on the record), sounding like it could score either an early winter rainstorm or a Michael Mann sex scene. Like that director, VanPortfleet's style is still distinct and recognizable -- it's just been reduced to its dark essentials here.
~ Justin Stewart, Splendid

I was very excited to get this in the mail. The mastermind behind Lycia, one of the greatest gothic/ambient bands ever to surface this earthly soil, Mike Van Portfleet has released a solo album. And it does not disappoint. Its packaging is absolutely great for the music itself: Photos of simple shadowed trees, nice beiges offset with tranquil greens, cold blues, and a glimmering horizon - reflecting both melancholy and beauty in equal rations. And speaking of which, let's get to that, shall we?
The opener "Deep in the Morning Sun" gradually fades in with some very warm and familiar Lycia-esque lows with the trademark VanPortfleet picked-guitars-from-underwater coming in and out every now and again. Extremely low-mixed, sensually muffled drums sprinkled about give a feel of beating rain on a roof, with "Lycia Ambient" playing in the background. The way this track is structured: you think it's going to go into this great climax, yet JUST keeps you out of reach of it. This isn't a bad thing at all, as the way this album was written, most scenarios stretch out two to three songs. It's kind of like having three mini movies. This one in particular goes into the next song, "Echoes of the Lost Sea": a bombastic, heavy wave of low booms with tiny high end glimmers coming up for air. This floats right into "Toward the Blinding Glare", a sombre Steve Roach-esque starter, yet as the track progresses, more of Van Portfleet's noisy, arcane tones become evident, finalizing in a very depressive melody line slowly fading into nothingness.
The next series of tracks are more on a blatant Lycia tip, much to my delight. "The Call of the Horizon Line" comes in with intense underwater guitar screaming, then ends softly with sounds that greatly recall Aphex Twin's "Selected Ambient Works II." This just glides on in to the highlight of the album, "Stellar Buckshot Awaits" - it could pass legitimately for a Lycia song! More ambient in sound, but all the classic Burning Circle/Cold/Estrella elements are there, from the super-strong main trickling melody chorus as only VanPortfleet can do, to the more ambient verse sections. And yes, you hear Mike sing as only he can: a cool, ethereal whisper-wheeze accenting simple, ambient verse sections - and garnishing the chorus. Superb.
The similarities between Lycia sort of cease here, but of course are still very much "there." The next two tracks "Dark Gateway" and "Strange Star Transmissions" are more of a nature theme, the former track feeling like the shells being washed away from shore slowly with it's strong and fading waves, and the latter track trading up low-end rumbles you will feel in your gut with twinkling, high end dissonant drops. Strange Star Transmissions, indeed.
The last two tracks are sort of a reiteration of barren wastelands and melancholic paths. "Stellar Shower Begins" is a variation of the verse line from "Stellar Buckshot Awaits," but without moving to the slightly hopeful chorus. It just glides along, almost getting to that point, but never quite. Beyond the Horizon Line closes with "Unsettled New Day" with it's eerie, arcane beats, clicking metal sounds, and mentally draining low tones harkening Bleak, another one of VanPortfleet's bands. This ends in total despair - fading out in melancholic ambience.
Most ambient releases you could pass off for background music, save for a few gripping artists. This is another one to add to the "cool" list of ambient music. But who could expect anything less from the master of ambient gothic rock? 9 out of 10 for Mr. VanPortfleet.
~ TwoBlock.net

The solo album by Lycia’s Mike Van Portfleet is a stunning piece of dark ambient work, which does not sound simply like a mostly-ambient Lycia album, but explores entirely new textures and sounds that should delight fans of that band and dark ambient fans in general.  The deep sea/deep space imagery suggested by some of the song titles is appropriate, as the album is a journey through dark, swaying landscapes that suggest vast, shifting interstellar or oceanic spaces.
His guitar work and whispered vocals are recognizable on the fifth track “Stellar Buckshot Awaits” but the overall feeling is one of introspective ambience and sound textures drifting across an ever-changing backdrop.  The end of the album becomes darker, with thudding thunderclouds darkening the starry sky and the rhythms escalate into something more foreboding.
As the nights lengthen and days become darker this will be a perfect album to listen to as autumn and winter strip the trees bare and the dawn casts a cold, unearthly glow on the horizon.
~ Sarada, Gothic Revue

Though it's been hinted at in the past, evidently the timing was right for Mike VanPortfleet of Lycia to release a solo album. This piece is heavily atmospheric and might be a bit disorienting if you go into it expecting to hear A Day In The Stark Corner, which this album is NOT. What this album is, in fact, is brilliant and beautiful. Heavy ambient loops building up atmosphere and tension through the first four tracks. I promise you this, when you reach track 5 "Stellar Buckshot Awaits", you will find yourself in familiar territory. The guitar sound that makes him so recognizeable, and that brilliant voice, are waiting for you. I nearly leapt for joy to hear his brilliant, whispy voice calling from the horizon line. Misery and mastery become one in this incredible album. This is the album to get and is available directly through Silber Media's website.
~ David Poseidon, Gothic Beauty

I have absolutely no clue where my mind were at when I recently decided to start listening to Mike VanPortfleet’s Beyond the Horizion Line just after a nightly film session including David Lynch’s Lost Highway. As you probably know it’s a pretty fucked-up film that leaves you with more questions than answers so following it up with Beyond the Horizon Line’s general dark theme of something unknown immediately seemed to put just about everything on its edge.
Dark, ambient drones can be one of the most boring styles of music I can imagine but when performed right it’s really something that goes beyond words. Former Lycia frontman Mike VanPortfleet’s glacial take on the style is everything but boring, scraping off layer after layer from a sound sculpture that somehow manages to be foreboding and majestically beautiful at the same time. The trance-inducing floaters seem to be carrying heavy burdens of tension on their shoulders and maybe that’s why things never become too static and predictable, always moving slowly into new interesting territories. According to VanPortfleet himself these mostly instrumental clusters of sound form a concept record of sorts, involving a growing fear of the sky and it bringing the end of the world over the course of a 24 hour cycle, from sunrise to just before dawn with the fear the sun will never rise again. So maybe that blend of dread, strange star submissions and minimalistic beauty isn’t so surprising after all.
This is a record that walks the dark gateway with echoes of the eerie depths quietly ringing in one’s ears and I guess such words are kind of typical for a patient artist whose work develops slowly and painstakingly. Every one of the ten tracks captured here brings something interesting to the table, and more often than not the final results amaze. The Scandinavian winter is still far away but those of you who’d like to get a glimpse of what is to come should definitely scrape the ice off this frosty package of music.
~ Mats Gustafson, Foxy Digitalis

Beyond the Horizon Line is an excellent example of why Silber is such a gratifying and rewarding label. This is Lycia member Mike VanPortfleet's first solo album without the band. The compositions are stark, fragile, ambient, ethereal, and soothing. Instead of using traditional elements in his music, VanPorfleet creates soundscapes that don't necessarily rely on melody or structure in order to create the intended mood. The overall effect is subtle and slightly eerie...with some wonderfully icy lead guitar occasionally drifting in and out of the picture. This disc could either be used as mood enhancement or as a soundtrack to use while watching videos. The packaging features some absolutely beautiful photography. Destined for obscurity, Beyond the Horizon Line presents unusual sounds for unusual places. Truly lovely stuff.
~ Babysue

This highly evocative fine dark ambient release comes from the inner sanctum of Mike VanPortfleet, The founder of the acclaimed ethereal band Lycia. The soundscapes on this solo release consistently portray a vast sense of environmental and human loneliness, steeped in a feeling of resolute isolation as if shipwrecked on another planet with no hope of rescue. The thick slow waves of harmonic movement have a almost geological texture as if the ocean waves of this planet have turned to a dry oozing magma like substance which one could hold in hand. Occasional slow and distant processional dirge beats  emerge outwards to join with thematic strands further inflicting a potent reminder of a parallel life back home.  While the atmosphere is dark there is comfort in these shadows.
~ Steve Roach

Guitarist and sound designer Mike VanPortfleet creates daringly minimal soundscapes on Beyond the Horizon Line. While there are apt comparisons to be made to ambient music and even slowcore, what VanPortfleet does imparts a singular uneasiness all its own. Glacially paced, keening loops of sound, many guitarist-based but attenuated to blur identity, drift out of the speakers.  After gradual transformation, they are apt to vanish as suddenly as they arrived, like mist dissipated by blasts of wintry wind. Those concerned with variety, both of tempi and affect, need to find another album - VanPortfleet is steadfast in his refusal to depart from this unified sonic approach. Each piece is filled with tension and foreboding of paranoiac proportions - a desolate creation as inspiring as it is fearsome.
~ Christian Carey, Copper Press

I’d imagine anyone that’s even vaguely familiar with darkwave music probably knows who Mike VanPortfleet is. Mike began his music career back in the early 80’s with Lycia who would later become one of the most admired and respected bands in the darkwave scene. However as the 90’s were coming to their end Lycia became more silent and Mike moved on to other musical ideas. Beyond the Horizon Line is Mike’s first solo album, and for the most part it’s quite a departure from what he was doing with Lycia.  On Beyond the Horizon Line Mike creates dark and icy sounding ambient music straight from his home base in the hot Arizona desert. As usual with ambient music we have some melodic moments filled with beautiful synth work and also lots of bleak droning moments on this album. Fortunately the album belongs more so to the former, but it’s a very slow paced ambient record which naturally gives it more of the droning quality (not that I have a problem with that though). Mike takes the listener on a slow paced chilly ride that’s filled with an unadulterated dark atmosphere that makes you feel like you’re in a cold dark cave or perhaps wandering through a frost covered field with an endless assault of snow and wind bashing against you. In addition there’s also some ghostly sounding spoken parts far off in the distance that only add to the unsettling feeling already present in the music. Mike’s guitar playing also makes sporadic appearances, but if you don’t pay attention it might blow right past you, and make you think its simply synth sounds. If cold ambient music like Apoptose or Northaunt interests you or if you’re just curious about Mike’s current musically endeavors than be sure to pick up this enjoyable album."
~ Blackwinged, Lunar Hypnosis

"With the final release of the long-awaited Empty Space album, the members of Lycia did something they'd been threatening for years. The legendary underground band was put to rest, and the casket was closed. However, it wasn't the end of the story. Lycia founder and cornerstone Mike VanPortfleet has now returned with his first post-Lycia solo album, Beyond the Horizon Line. Shedding Lycia's guitar-oriented ethereal post-punk sound for ambient electronics, VanPortfleet has managed to evolve artistically and create a new, unique sound rather than simply recording a Lycia album under his own name.
Largely favoring swirling, spacious, metallic atmospheric soundscapes over traditional compositions, the album's dark, foreboding atmosphere and full, layered sound sometimes provide something of an airier, more abstract, less claustrophobic counterpoint to VanPortfleet's past. Its sound is largely built on subtlety; repetitive foundations brought to life through delicate ebbs and flows. VanPortfleet also shows remarkable control over spatial elements. Reverb-drenched sounds often dissolve into more abstract, airy "breaths" that flow outward to create a shell around the songs' more concrete elements. The album's forays into minimalism often yield results that sound just as powerful and full as its more layered and complex offerings.
Despite the painfully obvious differences in both sound and approach, elements of VanPortfleet's past work still bubble just beneath the surface of Beyond the Horizon Line's more electronic, loop-based, largely instrumental set. Familiar programmed percussion lies buried under the ambience of "Deep in the Morning Sun", "Unsettled New Day", and "Stellar Shower Begins" as well as "Stellar Buckshot Awaits", which also prominently features VanPortfleet's trademark reverb-drenched whispered vocals and Lycia-esque lead guitar. At other times, VanPortfleet wears his influences on his sleeve. "Echoes of the Lost Sea", for example, could just as easily have been culled from Black Tape for a Blue Girl's A Chaos of Desire, while the sound-sculpting of Steve Roach, who worked on the production of Lycia's Tripping Back Into the Broken Days, seems to have left its own indelible impression.
In the end, Beyond the Horizon Line is really sort of a blend of the past and present; subtle hints of VanPortfleet's past projects and influences buried beneath a new musical voice and his own current musical sensibilities and penchant for sonic experimentation. Whether VanPortfleet is subtly manipulating a pre-existing vast sonic universe or building an entire wall of sound with a mere twig and half a nail, the album's ten tracks display impressive artistry and veteran skill without losing track of substance and emotion. Considering the fact that Lycia's diverse fan base ranges from the ambient/ethereal crowd to goths to metal fans, this decidedly more electronic ambient/ethereal offering most certainly won't please everyone and will likely prove a bit too monotonous and abstract for VanPortfleet's more rock/metal-oriented fans. However, fans of ambient music, whether familiar with VanPortfleet's work or not, will likely find Beyond the Horizon Line to be quite exceptional.
~ Joshua Heinrich, Grave Concerns

This solo outing by Mike of Lycia is a fine piece of work; with ten mostly instrumental soundscapes. Living up to it's title; this open up vast distances of space. Music for the day after the end of the world. Endless panoramas of desolation; a sky filled with smoke and ghosts. Last factories spewing out thick choking vapor, as the smell of something burned suffuses everything. The loneliness of a train whistle cries repeatedly in the distance like something lost. Everything moves in profound slow motion; a droplet of rain takes a year to fall all the way to the ground. This best recalls the more ambient work of Rapoon, while maintaining a personality that is quite consistent and distinctive. Cool to cold icy apocalyptic soundtracks, looking for any sign of light from a blackened and looming horizon line.
~ George Parsons, Dream Magazine

I don't often play ambient music, but I wanted to make an exception, because it fits to what I bring in this show. Like often with ambient on track one we hear distant noises and loops in the back, forming together one echo-drone sound with the feeling of a big bubble space environment where the individual sounds echo around.
~ Gerald Van Waes, Psyche van het Folk

Abject fear and insanity have an inherent sound attached to them.  It’s a soft, foreboding, and quite ominous stream of musical abstracts that fires synapses in our brains, revving up core emotions.  Thus far, Lycia is the only band that has effectively sound-tracked those.  Mike VanPortfleet has gone a step further by creating the active audio component of dread and utter desperation, mainlining it directly into your soul.
I used to think, back in the 70s, that there existed no better expressway into fear than Tangerine Dream’s Stratosfear until I heard Lycia’s hair-raising Cold.  Since then, Cold has become the sole audio expression of the bleakness of helpless existence.  A word of warning to the uninitiated, Lycia musical forays are terrifying to hear as they induce the very horror they explore.
In this solo issue, away from the influences of Lycia , VanPortfleet aptly walks through the nether regions of our corruptible humanity via minimalist pathways.  Beyond the Horizon Line begins with a steady flow of deep, synchronous chants and eerily enchanting banshee whisperings, interspersing with an industrial screech of metal.  There is no light in this world, only a feeling along for some sense of border, of which there is none.
The anger in this music is fierce, the threat of violence just beyond your field of vision.  There are tracks that are reminiscent of Tangerine Dream, especially  “Stellar Buckshot Awaits”, which reminds one of Ridley Scott’s Legend and its closing theme.  But where Legend exudes an ending of happiness, “Stellar Buckshot Awaits” runs a seemingly happy thread of music underneath an overwhelmingly frightening overlay.  What may seem a clash of emotions actually becomes a far more sinister run of music that will unnerve you.
Wind, metal, and darkness are the threads of this work.  The sound of the hot wind is relentless, rising and falling with the terror of Horizon Line’s world; the wind carrying with it the stinging industrial smells of metal on metal from some unknown mechanism of pain.  Track after track, you’re assaulted with crawling skin set to music.  Beyond the Horizon Line is an unyielding world of anguish, desperation, and a barrage of fear.
I’ve always considered VanPortfleet’s work with Lycia to be a travel through the silent and uncharted darkness of humanity. Whether that work is representational of humanity’s loneliness, its anger, its fears, its hatred, or a hybrid of all of them, Beyond the Horizon Line contains the essence of them all behind a curtain of music that barely shelters us from the horrors found past them.
Ten modular tracks, ten different journeys; Beyond the Horizon Line is filled with 60+ minutes of varying soundscapes. All of them will unsettle you.
~ Matt Rowe, Music Tap

Talk about truth in advertising. Mike VanPortfleet of Lycia's new album is titled Beyond the Horizon Line, and it sounds exactly like you're journeying through the clouds, beyond the sun. This all-instrumental album opens with silence, and then slowly floats forward as a hazy, ever-evolving wave. Song titles like "Echoes of the Lost Sea" and "Night Sky Illumination" are perfectly evocative of the album's well-crafted mood, which at various times strikes me as comforting, lonely, gorgeous, frightening and hopeful, though the pieces are all open-ended enough that perhaps I'm placing my own moods and feelings onto those of the album and hearing through that lens. A quiet, ambient work of both grace and complexity, Beyond the Horizon Line presents us with atmosphere after stunning atmosphere...the perfect sonic equivalent of daydreaming about air travel, or space travel, or flying like Superman (or a ghost, more appropriately).
~ Dave Heaton, Erasing Clouds

There are musicians, and then there are artists. Blessed with a name befitting a gourmet cook, Southern California sound professor Boyd Rice instead took no name at all. He recorded his first batch of hypnotic looped-tape sound collages in 1975, adopting the name Non soon thereafter to describe his mission of creating "something that blanks out your brain." He achieved this peculiar goal through layered manipulations of mangled vinyl scratches, gutted guitars and inverted sheets of white noise. Rice is many things: short filmmaker, writer and even public Church of Satan advocate (really), but this retrospective deals solely with the surgically precise sheets of organically produced nothingness that would help give rise to an entire genre of ambient bedroom music. Thirty years later, dark ambient is its own well-established underground genre. Arizona's Mike VanPortfleet emerges from a 15-year career fronting the hauntingly atmospheric gothic rock band Lycia to produce one of the best dark ambient collections in recent memory. The more thickly atmospheric Beyond the Horizon Line conjures spirits in an ethereally purposeful afterlife phalanx, where Non evokes a vague, uncertain purgatory. Horizon tracks such as "Echoes of the Lost Sea" and "Unsettled New Day" are vivid like the indigo glare from the first wisps of daybreak. This stuff is the gateway to another place entirely. No reservations required.
~ Michael Chamy, Dallas Observer

This is Mike VanPortfleet's post Lycia debut. Lycia is a band that I really like. Silber Records, though small is a great choice for this record and their fans will certainly love this. I like what the label stands for, which is to release great music.  While Beyond The Horizon Line sounds close to Lycia, the bands fans will certainly find kinship here but it makes you wonder why it wasn’t released as a Lycia album? The big difference here is that there are fewer vocal tracks. It's more like chant or ambient music which is good for relaxation or meditating. This could be Mike VanPortfleet's greatest creation to date and if you are looking for something different or experimental you should check this out. The music is so soothing. I wouldn't really call this new age music because it’s more cinematic and extraordinary but fans of new age may just fall in love with this as well.
~ Adhab Al-Farhan, 1340Mag

De equipes rond het Amerikaanse Silber Records zijn goed bezig. Deze keer mag voor hen Mike VanPortfleet solo gaan. Hij was de bezieler van Lycia een darkwave groep die furore maakte van '88 tot '99. Op zijn eerste solo plaat gaat hij resoluut een ander weg op ver van de wave vandaan. Binnen toegankelijke structuren zet hij door veelvuldig gebruik van loops soundscapes op. De gitaar klinkt ver weg maar komt in de vorm van een drone soms toch door de ijsvlakte heen. VanPortfleet's zijn scapes komen zo van de noordpool aangedreven, koud, ondoorgrondelijk maar mooi.
~ Tom Wilms, Gonzo

Puro ambient... Una serie de pequeños "soundtracks" para todo tipo de historias, o bien un gran soundrack para una película de arte, o bien sonidos para relajarse (y ni se imaginen Café del mar o algo parecido) es el experimento que presenta Mike VanPorfleet, de Lycia, bajo el mismo sello de su banda.
En este trabajo solista, VanPorfleet se dedica a elaborar colocando sábana sobre sábana sonora, acompañando de sonidos o ruidos aquí y allá, creando un medioambiente interesante, totalmente minimalista.
La larga y "agobiante" (por la sensación que da al escucharla) "Deep In The Morning Sun" puede que hasta te de sed, enmedio de un desierto que se alcanza a escuchar gracias a los sonidos parecidos a un violín y "voces" lejanas en un beat de pasos y pasos y pasos y....
"Echoes Of The Lost Sea" me dió la sensación de haber llegado finalmente al fondo de una manera un tanto repentina (sobre todo después del largo viaje bajo el sol) con su lento vaivén y los "sonidos distorsionados" de la superficie, escuchados desde el fondo. ¿O será que el sol hace delirar e imaginar o alucinar el océano?
Probablemente, puesto que continúa el viaje "hacia el resplandor enceguecedor" largo, hasta monótono. Te sientes ya en un "performance" o en un museo de arte moderno, contemplando piezas incomprensibles, mientras pasa también "The Call Of The Horizon Line", abstracta como todo el disco.
Llega, sin embargo, "Stellar Buckshot Awaits" con un poco más de musicalización. El "soundtrack" cambia y los sonidos procesados y sintéticos de la guitarra le dan otro sentido mientras comienzan a aparecer las voces a lo lejos. un track que necesita el disco a estas alturas. Sin dejar de manejar el etereo sonido ambiental. Se asemeja más a partes del trabajo de Gordon Reid. Buen track!
Vuelve la abstracción casi industrial con "Night Sky Illumination", devolviendo la parsimonia al disco hasta su final, "Unsettled New Day", robotizante, industrial, marcial ...
Un disco digno del sello ruso Electroshock y buen representante de la expermientación promovida por Silber Records.
~ Ciro Velázquez, Eufonia

Después de la ruptura de Lycia en 1999, Mike VanPortfleet vuelve con todas sus armas y presenta otro esperado lanzamiento que dará oscuridad en septiembre de este año. En este CD titulado Beyond The Horizon Line podremos encontrar una magia abrumadora hecha por las mismas manos de Mike VanPortfleet, que nos hace llegar un poco de Dark Ambient Post Apocalíptico, que dibujara como si esto fuera poco el mismo fin del mundo. Cabe destacar que esta realización será realizada por Silber Media y que contara con 12 espectaculares pistas que nada tiene que envidiarle a Lycia, inclusivamente hasta llega a opacarla.
~ Punto Moon

L’orizzonte è più grigio che mai....
Dalla Projekt, culla dell’ethereal made in USA, giunge il primo lavoro solista di Mike Vanportfleet, mente guida dei Lycia, gruppo che negli anni novanta ha avuto il merito di saper interpretare il gothic in una personalissima maniera, congelandolo in maestosi ghiacciai di elettrica psichedelia. Se i precedenti di Mike facevano ben sperare, il suo disco d’esordio invece lascia francamente l’amaro in bocca. Un’ora riempita di stereotipi senza eleganza, proposti con un pressappochismo che non trova spiragli di note positive. Da una parte brani come “Echoes Of The Lost Sea”, “Towards The Blinding Glare” e “Unsettled New Day” si protraggono verso un’ambient oscura e sinistra del tutto velleitaria imbastita su tele incolori e piatte, in “Night Sky Illumination” sono presi invece di mira istituzioni quali Steve Roach e Vidna Obmana, con trame sognanti e armoniose, deficitarie però di ricercatezza sonora e di quella tangibile finezza che distingue i maestri dai meri imitatori. “Stellar Buckshot Awaits” è invece un ponte con il passato, un telaio di chitarre, drum-machine e vocals viscerali in puro Lycia-style, ma onestamente ai tempi di “A Day In The Stark Corner” sarebbe stato un pezzo bruttino. Se questo album fosse stato intitolato “oltre la linea dell’oblio” sarebbe stato un titolo più azzeccato.
~ Davide Del Col, Kronic

Cosa c'è oltre la linea di orizzonte?
Il leggero strato di terriccio che ricopre la bara dei Lycia è ancora morbido ed umidiccio. Sono passati pochi mesi da 'Empty Space', vale a dire l'estremo saluto con cui la band statunitense ha voluto congedarsi dai propri fan, e Mike VanPortfleet ha deciso di ripresentarsi innanzi a loro con un progetto solista che trae ispirazione dalla fredda essenza della natura e sfrutta nuove tecnologie di registrazione. 'Beyond The Horizon Line' è un CD meno angoscioso ed opprimente rispetto a quanto fatto in passato, in quanto rinuncia alle influenze post-punk ed industriali caratterizzanti la discografia dei Lycia, per addentrarsi unicamente in territori ambient post-apocalittici sorrette da strutture minimaliste ('Night Sky Illumination'). Il distacco tra i due progetti è netto, tuttavia non mancano punti di contatto come in 'Stellar Buckshot Awaits' e 'Stellar Shower Begins' dove il fantasma dei Lycia ci ricorda le origini di VanPortfleet. Pochi artisti al mondo sono riusciti, come VanPortfleet, ad esplorare la disperazione umana disegnando scenari desertici e glaciali trasformando queste sterili visioni in fredde emozioni. Nulla è più spaventoso e doloroso della sensazione di vuoto che l'uomo prova quando spalanca la porta dell'incertezza e 'BTHL' si prodiga affinché l'uscio resti sempre aperto.
~ Lux, Ritual