Colleen

Twinkling bells, trembling guitars and tiny music boxes -- these are the things that make up Golden Morning Breaks. A low and haunting piece of ambient music, Morning is the work of Colleen Schott, a French performer with a cut-and-paste approach. Often, this sort of delicate electronic music can be used to soothe or to settle, but Colleen suggests something more sinister. The wind chimes that chatter through "The Happy Sea" seem stirred by a presence that's decidedly otherworldly, and the slow trickle of xylophone that spills over the skeletal guitar in "I'll Read You a Story" is as ominous as a long shadow or a bleeding stranger. It's as if Colleen set out to score Werner Herzog's Heart of Glass, where the actors were placed under hypnosis to distinctly unnerving effect. Its faade may seem calm and placid, but its slow movement and ghostly tone hint at a deep and fascinating unease.