Fernando Perdomo 2026
Looking at the skies for a longer time, American composer ventures towards a wondrously worrisome variety of moods.
Clouds 2
It’s so simple to surmise that serializing of his output, as “Waves” suggested, gives Fernando Perdomo an easy way out of casting a wider creative net, and first installment of “Clouds” seemed to support the same concept. This album, however, will turn everything inside out to demonstrate that the multi-instrumentalist hasn’t lost his taste for experiments. The listener can safely ignore a pair of fairly unusual, for such Perdomo project, bonus tracks – an airy take on “Auld Lang Syne” and an actual song, voice-driven serenade “Hiding Under Clouds” – because there’s enough material to get into, and behind, the spirit of things, because Fern didn’t stop at a vinyl length of a record here, nor he limited the pieces’ number to a regular ten. Instead, he took the platter’s flow to an event horizon – a temporary one, of course. So yes, simple it may be, but in fact, the understated sophistication of the music om offer should reflect the imaginative player’s genuine personality.
Indeed, the translucent “Reflections” does just that, sending delicate echoes of strum across the sonic panorama, with every movement of Perdomo’s fingers on strings captured in strikingly intimate detail. But though folksy opener “Monowai Sky” finds him sculpt, in a pseudo-epic way, a nigh intangible, albeit ultimately anthemic, soundscape by turning a volume knob clock- and counterclockwise, before dropping acoustic notes over a resonant, almost percussive background, and “Ghosts Of Flight” carries this mesmeric vibe further, there are cuts which defy the overall romanticism. Thus, the increasingly exquisite “Dam Right” explores dynamic depth of Fernando’s field of view rather than its melodic aspect, and “Give A Dam” adds an earth-shattering rumble and nuanced filigree to the aural panorama, while “Chill” focuses on space between the strokes until a tune is introduced and an imposing, sprawling edifice is slowly erected, a cathedral of rare elegance.
Elsewhere, “Ominous Mass” breathes rococo nuance to measure the room, “The Lake Is Another Sky” leads the audience outside to admire the vista as outlined by this ballad’s bell-ringing chords, and “Sunset At 10am” aims at pregnant mutations of harmonies that reach for celestial glory. Yet if “WFD” marries rage to serenity in the most organic manner and spices the heady mélange with whiffs of exotica, “Thunder” goes for a faux groove courtesy of bass to bring the vertiginous journey to a triumphant close. An unexpected rapture of an album.
*****
