Vacíos presents a gentle ambient soundscape with ever evolving deep emotional nuances that kept me completely engaged for its full duration. The experience felt genuinely profound and personal. While I can easily imagine someone putting this on as soothing background sound, an engaged listening approach took me on a complex emotional journey. For the remainder of the review, I've opted to present a direct stream of that experience.
Track one, No Quiero Perderte... (translation: I Don't Want to Lose You...). The album opens very slowly with string-like textures. The tones pass by and evolve. I'm totally captured only moments in. The timbre slowly shifts from dark to light, from organic to inorganic, the harmony from consonant to dissonant, and back in various combinations. There's a haunting eeriness and a feeling of subtle determination. I sense something like denial, a feeling of deeper emotions being held below the surface.
Track two, Ayer No Eras Así (translation: Yesterday You Weren't Like This). There's a soft descent that plays with the underlying feeling of darkness in a way that feels more conscious. At times there's a distant reminiscent tenderness but those feelings shift to something colder, perhaps more thoughtful. I sense a detachment, like walking through your memories suspended around you and looking in on frozen moments of the past while achingly aware of the distance between now and then. The occasional discordant harmony flirts with anger but never seems to give in. I feel a sort of suspended unease, an uncomfortable weightlessness.
Track three, Ese Sentimiento (translation: That Feeling). Now we're introduced to a higher pitch tone that cuts through with a sense of clarity, like seeing someone dearly missed in a dream and finally saying the things you wish you could have said long ago all while knowing it's perhaps too good to be true.
Track four, Aquéllos Días (translation: Those Days). We move forward with a less uneasy feeling. I'm met with an understated ethereal bliss, a feeling of comfort but not an anesthetizing comfort, instead a comfort that feels acutely aware of precarity, like a needle balanced on its head. I feel grateful.
Track five, Vacíos (translation Empty). That sense of determination has returned but now accompanied with an active knowing and acceptance that was missing from before. There's a cold and calculating undercurrent paired with a sense of anticipation.
Track six, Melancólicos (translation: Melancholic). A less emotionally intense wistful interlude before the final track.
Track seven, Por Fin Hay Calma (translation: Finally there is calm). Now in the final track, the feeling begins more hopeful but reserved. There's a peaceful quality that's eventually undercut by a looming darkness. The dissonance blooms into the forefront (I felt genuine emotional investment in the story at this point, surprised like reading a plot twist). A sense of understanding fades in and back out before the dissonance resolves. A distant warning siren approaches and evolves into more complex dissonance before it too dissolves. The reminiscent feelings of before have been replaced by something more forward looking. I get the impression of stepping into the unknown future rather than stepping out of the known problems of the past and present. The new feeling of uncertainty comes off simpler and more primal and slowly fades into acceptance, bringing the album to a close.