Biosphere

*2023 reissue* Mark Richardson, Pitchfork: Biosphere's Geir Jenssen knows from cold. Residing as he does near the Arctic Circle in Norway, Jenssen understands the psychological implications of a sun that, like a lamented deadbeat parent, routinely disappears for months at a time, and the absence of that essential lifeforce takes an inevitable emotional toll that informs Jenssen's art. It's tempting to say that Biosphere's bleak music sounds as it does for the same reason countries of Norway's approximate latitude make the world's best Vodka. But then Jenssen's other great passion is mountaineering (he has climbed the 26,906 foot Himalayan peak Cho Oyu without oxygen), suggesting a kernel of inspired humanity frozen in the tundra. The vacuum of space gets pretty close to absolute zero, cold's recognized ideal, so it makes sense that the conceptually minded Jenssen sets albums there. His latest trip into the beyond started when French radio commissioned Jenssen to create a piece using their archives....