it's all good…

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A brief track from the Scottish songsmiths which has been ably employed in ambient mixes by those in the know, including Jon Marsh (of Beloved fame) on his simply sublime Travelogue mix. Perhaps this was the beginning of the habit amongst eighties ‘rock’ artists of including a leftfield slab of ambience tucked away on an album? Always exciting to discover an album that you’ve previously only recognise from the artist or the songs that were released as singles, has something completely different in pace and vibe tucked away unobstrusively in the middle of the B-side. Long may I continue to discover them.

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Haven’t posted a ‘classic mix’ for some time and I’ll continue the atmospheric vibes with this mix I ripped some time ago from an original cassette that I bought back in the early 90s. The flow of this mix is incredible, it’s still ‘ambient’ in my opinion despite consisting of some techno/trance tracks; for example no.07, which to my ears sounds like some American Indians chanting happy birthday! The only track I recognise is the Dave Angel one that I have but layered and weaved throughout are field recordings and tv documentary samples from whomever mixed this up, unless they themselves are part of the tracks being used, I just can’t be sure?! Many a time, I’ve put this on and drifted off into hypnagogic states of conciousness where the music has shaped whatever my minds eye conjures up for entertainment. If you have access to a quiet location with facilities to listen to music, preferably reclined, for just over ninety minutes then go indulge your senses and report back with tales of phantasmagoria.

01. | 0:00:00 | DJ’s own field recordings
02. | 0:03:26 | Michael Brook – Pond Life
03. | 0:04:29 | ?
04. | 0:06:40 | Michael Brook – Mimosa
05. | 0:10:23 | ? (Global Communication track?)
06. | 0:15:52 | ?
07. | 0:22:56 | ?
08. | 0:25:17 | ?
09. | 0:31:06 | ?
10. | 0:33:28 | sample from a Horizon science documentary
11. | 0:38:10 | ?
12. | 0:40:05 | DJ’s own field recordings
13. | 0:46:22 | ?
14. | 0:49:41 | ?
15. | 0:53:40 | Dave Angel – Brother From Jazz
16. | 0:57:41 | ?
17. | 1:00:52 | ? (track from the Guerilla Narcosis compilation?)
18. | 1:06:42 | sample from a Horizon science documentary
19. | 1:08:49 | Michael Brook – Midday
20. | 1:14:14 | ?
21. | 1:20:15 | Hypnopedia – Eclypse
22. | 1:23:39 | ?
23. | 1:29:00 | ?

Number of tracks and track times are my own guess and due to the nature of the mix, probably  susceptible to error.

Know any of the tracks? Please leave a comment and I’ll update the tracklisting. Keen to ID nos.20 & 22 so I can liberate them into my clutches, MWAH-HA-HA-HAAA!

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Continuing with the Aphex Twin, his own work this time. My favourite track from Selected Ambient Works 85-92; the spongy, slightly squelchy bass and the sample of Gene Wilder from Charlie And The Chocolate Factory.

We are the music makers
And we are the dreamers of dreams

Discogs listing

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The Ambient Collection, the album this track is from, along with The KLF’s Chill Out, were possibly the first two releases of the early nineties ambient era that I came across that built on my then fledgling taste in this genre of electronic music, adding to some of the possibilities that I had been introduced to by the German electronic outfit, Tangerine Dream. The whole album is a high quality tapestry of sounds from start to finish but, when forced to choose, this aural evocation of a desert isle with the crystal clear sea lapping gently at shoreline, transports me instantly in my mind’s eye. A brief free holiday, which is no bad thing living in the UK.

Notes from sleeve:

With the advent of the nineties a new decade of clubs and DJ’s have floated into our conciousness. Their trip is a journey into peace. An ambient ecstasy. The creation of a new musical travelogue. A minimalistic embrace of everything good about the hard and uncompromising trance-dance of house and the surrealism of ambient instrumentalism.

Ambient or ‘chill-out’ rooms have been set up in clubs all around the country as an alternative to the dancefloor. Pure ecstasy escapism. Rooms for day-dreaming, fantasising or hallucinating.

This ambient collection is a sound step into the future. A collection of tracks alternatively known as ‘New Age House’ or ‘Ambient House’. Everyday sounds, noises and atmospheres we’ve imagined and heard all our lives but never consciously listened to. An unfocused daydream with no background or foreground. A sense of not being yourself, of being apart from what you’re listening to. A drift into tranquillity, in and out of reality.

Oft played and more than often sampled the Art Of Noise have long been torchbearers for this form of ambient instrumentalism.

This collection has been compiled, defiled, remixed and generally ‘presided over’ by producer ‘Youth’. His thanks go to those who worked after ‘nights high noon’.

So…..chill out.

The sleeve notes above are interesting in that the concept of the ‘chill out’ room has disappeared in clubs, perhaps coinciding with the commercialization of club/rave culture. The youth movement had been co-opted, re-packaged and sold back to the generation that spawned it. The reaction of the establishment in the face of the moral panic that was provoked by the first wave in the late eighties, meant that licenced venues had new rules to abide by and these didn’t include providing rooms with cushions for people to lie down, relax, dream or talk in. Bloody chillers didn’t buy many alcoholic drinks anyway…

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This is by far the most outstanding track on the album Amber, which was one of the main reasons that I bought it (along with the photo used as the album cover) although on first listens, the quality across the whole album can seem a little patchy. I recall reading somewhere that the location for the photo is somewhere in Turkey, unsure if the colour of the sand is pink or it’s due to the way the sunlight is falling upon it, possibly a combination of the two; anyhow looks like a peaceful place to spend some time. I’ve listened to the album a couple of times since writing this post and it’s growing on me; certain sounds and the way some of the tracks are constructed remind me of Richard H. Kirk’s album The Number Of Magic, which was also released by Warp shortly after this album in ‘95. Got the album when it came out and, like most pieces of music, they evoke memories of that time – Blackheath, South London, living with my mate Andy, lying on the couch, smoke curling towards the ceiling…

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