Among such astronomically inclined artists (and there are many), the British trio of Steve Dinsdale, Duncan Goddard and Gary Houghton create some extremely breathtaking electronic musical experiences as Radio Massacre International. While the band's compositional structure alternates between atmospheric ambience, their sound is superbly rich with the flavor of Tangerine Dream, Vangelis or Klaus Schulze (all circa the 1970s). The Tangerine Dream comparison is strengthened by the addition to the synthesizer horde of searing guitar -- always a crowd pleaser.

RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL: Burned and Frozen (CDR on Northern Echo Recordings)

This release features a particularly sedate electronic mood. The melodies drift with comfortable airiness, slow-building with cyclic keyboard riffs and delicate tonal surfs. Soft electronic chittering supplies a subtle quasi-percussive rhythm that lazily interweaves with the spiraling keyboard rolls. The presence of stylishly spacey guitar is kept to a background manifestation, injecting an earthy quality to the icy music.

There are only two pieces on this 73-minute CDR...and one of them is 52 minutes long. That should give you an idea of the building pattern for this music: long and relaxed for maximum effect.

RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL: Diabolica (CDR on Northern Echo Recordings)

This one is also 73 minutes, broke into three pieces: 41, 27 and 7 minutes respectively. So, once again, the development span is expanded, allowing the astral melodies to accrete at a leisurely pace. Heavenly tones and gurgling electronics unfurl luxuriously, inevitably reaching more energetic passages with intertwining keyboard riffs. Enter the space guitar, stirring the languid sonic clouds with its distant cry. As the guitar expands in presence--and force--a thread of delicately soft E-perc crawls into the mix.

The second composition is far darker, lurking like a spacecraft carefully maneuvering through a crowded asteroid belt. A fuzzy rhythm thumps along in the barely disturbed pool of sound, only to begin to churn with more rapid sequencers. The tone of the piece reaches further into the bass regions, then soars into more fanciful ethers, with the pace increasing to a near frenzy.

The last, briefest composition is constructed around a terse guitar loop. Heavier E-perc and liquid electronics accompany this guitar expression. The mesh swells with power, producing a loving tension.

All of these pieces feature a strong sense of slowbuild melodics.

RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL: A Bridge Too Far (CDR on Northern Echo Recordings)

This 60 minute CDR features recordings from RMI's Klemdag Concert in 1997 in Holland. The five compositions average twelve minutes a piece, and include an early version of "Plastered in Paris" (which would later appear in a more structured form on the band's 1999 "Borrowed Atoms" double CD). Most of the remaining pieces were live improvs, displaying a superb sense of dynamic power and compelling melody.

The guitar tends to contribute more guidance with this release, with the electronics circling the lead growl.

There's a more versatile use of sounds too, expanding the sound into harsher auralscapes. The presence of drums and more traditional guitar playing during the final piece creates a particularly epic Pink Floyd passage injected with a Vangelis keyboard flavor.

RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL: Gulf (CDR on Northern Echo Recordings)

This 69 minute CDR is where the band truly master a dynamic and emotional sound. Keyboard cycles flourish and cavort, establishing a thick drama from the beginning with entrancing layers and ascendant melodics. Grinding yet soft percussive riffs create brooding undertones for several unearthly, quasi-mechanoid sounds that are melded into a brilliant cohesion by sweeping tonalities. Whether the mood is rhythmic or atmospheric, the result is a hold-your-breath intensity.

Although intended as a sonic treatise on the Gulf War conflict, the music also serves as an excellent interpretation of the grandeur of the gulfs of space, conjuring movement through swirling nebulae and clouds of dangerous dark matter.

RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL: Bothered Atmos (CDR on Northern Echo Recordings)

When the material for RMI's "Borrowed Atoms" release began to grow so profuse that the band were faced with the prospect of a triple CD, they debated long and intensely to cull the pieces down to a double CD. The remaining 74 minutes were salvaged from the obscurity of the cutting room floor and released as "Bothered Atmos", a companion disc to the double CD.

"Bothered Atmos" is a more sedate dose of RMI than their previous CDRs. The music waxes pensive and atmospheric; even the faster sequencers passages possess a sense of restraint dominated by calm. The guitar is present only within the piece "All the Water in the Universe is Melted Comets", which progresses from ambience through a rhythmic stage to a brooding finale.

"Cathedral Floor", the release's last piece, exhibits a crystalline delicacy, evoking sonic images of colored light streaming across the stone surface, sighing with flutish tonalities and waterfalling keyboards.