Review: Mire - Not Quite Where We Left It

Artist: Mire

Album: Not Quite Where We Left It

Label: Self-released

Release date: August 2025

I will freely admit that I abhor hyperproduction, and think it a plague on the modern music landscape, niche genres such as dark ambient included. Therefore, seeing that Berlin's Mire (whose work I haven't been exposed to until now) has had more than a dozen releases in 2025 alone instantly made me suspicious. In my experience, there are only three scenarios where an artist will release something so frequently: (i) they don't know how to discard material of lesser quality, (ii) they have been sitting on a lot of material for a long time before they decided to present it to the world, or (iii) they genuinely have a lot to say and express.

I'm happy to report that Mire definitely falls into the third category. Just like its beautifully evocative title, Not Quite Where We Left It is a nuanced and emotional sonic journey, depicted through chiming drones, lush background melodies, heavy static, field recordings and other ingredients typically espoused by artists on the more experimental fringes of drone & dark ambient. Even though the sounds themselves are electronic and heavily manipulated, Mire manages to give them a very organic feel through the careful use of dynamics, something that is surprisingly rare amongst drone-oriented artists; in fact, the elements are placed so carefully that the music almost has a sense of rhythm to it. Despite being composed of a single 27-minute track, the album (I think it deserved to be called more than an EP) flows beautifully and tells an engaging and coherent story from beginning to end without ever feeling monotonous or repetitive. Like the human experience, it's simultaneously calming and ominous, sober and sentimental, belonging to both the past and the present.

Overall, Not Quite Where We Left It is an excellent introduction to Mire's work, and I'm looking forward to exploring the rest of the artist's back catalogue. Few releases this year have put me in such a contemplative mood, and I'd be eager to see how Mire would handle a more typical LP format, perhaps with more tracks but fewer individual elements in each. In any case, there are glimpses of genius here, and I'm looking forward to what this promising new artist will unleash in the future.

Rating: 8/10