So there's a Gothic label called Projekt, and they were so kind as to send me music in the mail, which I listened to, and which I'm writing about now because it's some of the coolest stuff I've ever heard.

They sent me The Burning Circle and then Dust, the fifth release from Goth outfit Lycea. It's a two-disc set full of lush, spacey, rollicking sound, and it's all carried along by the whispery, chilling voice of leader Mike VanPortfleet. Bass player David Galas and new vocalist Tara VanFlower also make for the big Lycea darkness. The instrumental ingredients include some brooding keyboards and fair sprinkling of acoustic guitar. Lycea's a trip and they swirl.

Equally trippy is Well of Souls, a nicely packaged two-disc release by ambient innovators Steve Roach and Vidna Obmana. Pioneer Roach and prodigy Obmana got together in Roach's Arizona studio and whipped up an extensive combination of electronics, percussion, and overall ambient chemistry. It's guaranteed to take your ears, and perhaps your heart and mind, on a blazing tour of the sonic, the ethereal, the unanswered. And if these guys take you on just the right path, you may very well pass our buddies Lycea on the way. (Projekt)