Zentaro Watanabe - Surinukeri Kokoro [ Nagi no Asukara / A lull in the sea ]

Ah I love this track a lot. This track was something that I noticed in the first episode itself, but I wasn't much thoughtful about the track. It was in the second time that this track played that I actually noticed this properly and repeated the scene to listen to this. At that time, I totally fell in love with this track even though I had one qualm with this at one part of it. That part has always kind of irked me and feels kind of feeling breaking. Will talk about that a bit later.

The track starts off with some nice, little emotional and soft solo piano acting as a prelude to the main music. Then at 0:26 the track actually starts with its main composition with those nice and soft violins and cellos in the background. I quite like this particular tune a lot, and love the fact that the track really develops on this tune going forward with it. The tune makes a really nice emotional atmosphere with these initial violins and slow paced music. The track remains in this sort of prelude phase in the first half of it.

After the 0:26 part, at 0:51 the previous part's violin and cello tune continues but this time with addition of the piano that was silent in the 0:26 part. Many tracks that do this do it really well, this addition of instruments one by one in the track, and this track also does it really nicely all the time maintining the main tune and the atmosphere.

After the 0:51 part finishes at 1:16 the track quickly starts picking up really powerfully. An instant feeling of intenseness can be felt from 1:16 when those rapid cello notes are added. Those rapid notes quickly add a lot of depth this track was developing on throughout its first half upoto 1:16. The pickup is quite quick from then and the track within a few seconds at 1:29 goes into its final flow. The pianos pick up their pace, the cellos start their own backing quickly changing music pace and the violins start the piece of music in this. From 1:29, the tune that violins produce is a higher pitched and a bit faster version of the same tune at 0:26, but at 1:40 the tune is a new one. This new part genuinely was so amazing to hear, it feels like a part that actually completes that particular tune whereas the previous parts were just developing on it. Not to mention these swaying violins have a really sort of heavy sadness and intensity in them which is extremely amazing.
One big part of this track are those cellos in the background from 1:29. If you listen to the track a bit loudly at that part, if you can make out the cellos behind the violins, you will notice the cello tune is different from how it was in 1:16 part. At 1:16 they were more of static, and quickly repeating notes. Here the cello notes variate themsevles while maintaining an even quicker pace of repeating. They don't produce a flowing music but more broken into different but quickly repeating notes. The variating notes of the cello really a a lot of intensity to it. Another important part were those muffled drums. Previously I thought its kind of weird having muffled drums, but to be honest when I imagine this track with non muffled drums, I actually feel that keeping them muffled was probably the best idea. This muffled sound is not as punchy as a normal drum bass and goes really well with the tune which is more oriented towards heavy emotional side.

The track enters its closure phase at 1:54 which is just a soft melody of violins and cellos, which is definitely quite nice acting as a closure.

Overall this track is a really solid composition no doubt, but one issue which I had with this track which I talked a little in the start is the little transition to the 1:29 part that starts at 1:22. The part from 1:22 to 1:27 is something that doesn't fit the flow of this track for me. From start to the end this track maintains a really good melody, but it was at that transition I always feel irked. For some reason, It just doesn't fit the track for me and every time I a listen to this track (i do listen quite a bit to this) its always that part that takes me off the flow. Its very rare to have a non fitting tune in the track, but this time its something I definitely notice really easily. These few seconds are the only downside of this track I really notice. While only for a few seconds, it still does kind of break the immersion.

But keeping that aside this track definitely is a gem for me. The next week's track however is my favourite track from this show and I love it a lot so stay tuned for it haha.

Our rating of this track: 8.5/10
Overall rating of this anime in terms of its background music : 9.5/10 (It was almost a 10, but there is a reason I deducted 0.5, some part of the reason I talked about here, the other in future upload :D)
Background : https://ibb.co/sH5Z1Nb
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