Ala Muerte - Santa Elena CD / Digital Download

Santa Elena, the debut full-length from Ala Muerte (Astoria, NY's Bianca Bibiloni), is a rich, ethereal excursion filled with beautiful sadness. Conceptually moving from the apocalyptic to a state of new beginning, Santa Elena explores solitude and personal growth through melodic tension and environmental metaphor. Layers of guitar and vocals swirl beneath softly sung lyrics. Gentle vocal melodies float atop dissonant sound collages sculpted from field recordings. Tension ebbs and flows throughout, only to explode with the introduction of a full drum kit on the closing track.

"With not one weak moment to be found, Santa Elena coheres with a shared unity, yet each song owns itself and stands alone. Santa Elena is a monumentally moving composition, and one of those few albums that truly defies written critique. Its beauty and power are best invoked the way they are intended, through sound."–Wears the Trousers Magazine

"An extraordinarily mysterious album… This is one of the few records I’ve heard in years that at times approaches the desperation and doldrums conjured up by Nico herself. Throughout this album, Bianca is accompanied by ethereal and visceral female harmonies and noises that counterpoint and buffet her performances, as though some sidereal wind were blowing through her soul." –Julian Cope (Head Heritage)

"Odd, distant, and moody... (Ala Muerte) writes songs that don't easily fit within any specific genre... and her arrangements are strangely puzzling and foreign. The more we spin this CD, the more difficult it is to describe. But for some reason we found that we kept coming back to this disc over and over and over again. Cool and very different. Highly recommended." -babysue.com

"Bibiloni's songs highlight mood over structure, and opt for mystery over hooks in haunting, drone-y panoramas (drone-o-ramas?) that conjure elements of Raymond Raposa's Castanets, early Black Heart Procession, and Carla Bozulich's gentler side. Deliciously dark fare." -Creative Loafing (Charlotte, NC)

"The stars of this 10-song journey are the multi-tracked contrapuntal harmonies of Bibiloni’s vaguely PJ Harvey-like voice, and the laptop atmospherics... The mood is so foreboding—witness the Mogwai-synth-jet-noise-meets-eerie-Swans-folk of opener “All Is Gone”—that keeping it at arm’s length seems like a psychological imperative." -Inland Empire Weekly

1. all is gone
2. demeter
3. selene (MP3)
4. grim
5. red flags
6. 1892
7. loki
8. she
9. choose your own ending
10. fireweed

Ala Muerte is Bianca Bibiloni

Release date: November 25, 2008

Artwork: Bianca & Andria Bibiloni

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