Yeah, you get a little jaded after the first three dozen of these in any given month. Thankfully, Sepia Dreamer have something to offer beyond the mere narcotic lull of most such recordings. First of all, while _The Sublime_ is indeed an instrumental album, it's far from a collection of meandering, dirge-like Casio work outs. The two minute opener "Gateway" might have you believe otherwise, but the remaining three tracks feature plenty of goth metal guitar/synth interplay and -- Eureka! -- they actually have a pulse. OK, the press bio and even the poem in the liner notes smack of the same pretension befalling those "other" projects I referred to above, but the actual product itself finds the musicians involved with their feet firmly grounded, despite the soporific theme of the album.

The bulk of _The Sublime_ consists of two tracks running fifteen and nineteen minutes. "The Exposition" continues where "Gateway" left off, with a classically influenced keyboard intro which doesn't bode well for those expecting another wank fest, but the track eventually alleviates those fears when the guitars kick in; all in all, a successful mood piece that expertly shifts from moody ambience to actual riff-based song craft. "Development" opens with the chugging minor key guitar riffs, later segueing into a David Gilmour-like exploratory duet with plinking keyboards before riling itself back up into a florid goth metal ambience.

In many ways, _The Sublime_ remains background music, but of the type that underscores one's nocturnal slumbers rather than the aimless elevator metal of a great deal of Sepia Dreamer's peers.