Pantha Du Prince joins forces with a brigade of bells. Bells: They can make for the most magical of musical ornamentation, their gliding chimes, airy jingles and graceful peals signifying a blissful trip through heaven’s gate on one’s way toward the astral plane. On the other hand, their singular sound can end up as the lead character in a portentous piece of grandiosity like Mike Oldfield’s 1973 opus, Tubular Bells. But electronic-music producer Pantha Du Prince—the musical alias of Hendrik Weber, the German maker of sometimes-deep, sometimes-tough, sometimes-odd but always-wonderful house and techno—has a bit of experience with bells; his 2010 album, Black Noise, was brimming with ringers. That record contained some of the loveliest music of a discography full of transcendent moments. But with Elements of Light, Weber’s collaboration with a crew of technically precise Norwegian players—not to mention a massive carillon, a three-ton beast featuring 50 bronze bells—he may have outdone himself; it’s a minimalist-yet-rich gem of an album.The carillon is only the half of it: Elements of Light features xylophones, marimbas, chimes, tubular bells and almost anything else capable of creating a bong, jangle, toll or tinkle, with Jaga Jazzist’s Martin Horntveth and Madrugada’s Erland Dahlen among those joining Weber in the studio. Presented as a suite, its five pieces only occasionally flirt with anything overtly “clubby”: The transition from “Particle” to “Photon”—a heavy kick drum
