Author: Jet Jaguar

I had a great time remixing “Peavey Rage” off Peace Point’s new album, Cycles. Here’s a video of how I remixed it. Fun times!

Neuro-Defragmentation (New_Words)

Got to be my favourite compilation of the year. A weird thing: as a whole it feels like it could be from one artist, just variations on beautiful, dreamy, synthy ambient from folks I’ve never heard of. But it also doesn’t all sound the same. A second weird thing: several tracks remind me of what I’m trying to do in recent months with my own music. Strange synchronicity.

Funki Porcini shows up, with a nice floating thing with far away voices that is nothing like what I remember him doing on Ninja Tune back last century. Mind you, I could point to someone else who did downtempo beats stuff and is now much more in the ambient camp. 😇

Some of the same artists are doing dancey vinyl on New_Words’ sister label and the album is tagged “grime”! 🤔 I guess if anything that weird, beatless version of grime that I never quite understood as a kind of dance music? It’s got the kind of sound selections and vibes that show up in dancier contexts, but no sign of drums here.

I hope New_Words are selling well off Bandcamp, because it’s bizarre how few people seem to have picked this up. Previous releases quote write ups from other music shops, so… 🤞

Teebs – Did It Again (self-released)

A nice wee single with Panda Bear from Animal Collective singing on the first track. Teebs is a producer with connections to that LA beat scene that included folks like Flying Lotus, Gasface Killer, Ras G, et al. He doesn’t release often, but when he does I pay attention. His style’s prettier, more delicate than most, often featuring acoustic sounds such as guitars, harps, and so on. Still groove-based in a very good way.

Nueen – Diagrams of Thought (Balmat)

I’m really impressed by this guy. Mostly drum-free, so I guess you’d say ambient, but in a bright and quite melodic way, not droney. And then there are beats and bassy moments that definitely sound like he must listen to plenty of dance music, even when sometimes those sounds are more like punctuation than a steady dancefloor thing.

I smile because it’s literally Balearic music – he’s from Menorca from memory – but not sure it sounds like how people use that as a genre descriptor. Great, anyway.

Cleared – Of Endless Light (Touch)

Beautiful softly swelling tracks, at their best when they have a bit of a metronomic slow mo pulse under them, not vying for attention but just stopping the drones from feeling settled. “Dawn” is heavy in a great way, but the title track is superb.

James Devane – Beauty Is Useless (Umeboshi)

It strikes me everything I’m writing about this time around is something that sounds like it could’ve been released a while back, with a few contemporary flourishes. This is slabs of kinda dubby, but also pretty and bright, techno, reminiscent of Kompakt about 15-20 years ago. Something like the Burger/Ink collaboration maybe.

When I say “slabs”, most tracks don’t really change. Like Devane’s set up some kind of musical system, hit record, let the system run for a bit, then at some point stopped recording again. I kind of love that in this context. Easy to get lost in it.

Purelink – Purelink EP (UwU dust bath)

Loving this US trio’s throwback ambient techno vibes, like the best of 90s R&S or something, but the definite standout for me is the pair of remixes by xphresh (Ben Bondy/Special Guest DJ). Cheeky use of a pop acapella recontextualised beautifully, plus a close to instrumental version if vocals aren’t your thing. I see there’s vinyl on pre-order if that’s what you’re into.

Jack Woodbury | Peter Liley – Unfathomed Waters (Genre Defying)

Beautiful textures and moods from these Wellington NZ composers. While it leans really ambient, I also love the noisy explosive stuff near the end. There is no way those later tracks, distorted duets between crashing drums and roaring sax, are not directly influenced by Colin Stetson, but I’m fully into it. “Enter the Temple” in particular.

I do find the name of this Rattle Records sub-label pretty cringey. 😬 Oh well! I’m definitely going to write this one up for AmbientNZ.com when I get a minute.

Accelera Deck – Alligator (self-released)

The idea of a 2-hour, 15-track single is hilarious. But it was a rec from a friend and I read what the artist has to say and was immediately into it:

“…I usually start each new recording with a rough outline, or concept. Maybe just a single word…, with Alligator I decided to treat the beats as textures and explore all the permutations in a similar spirit as how I think Seefeel or Basic Channel/ Rhythm & Sound would”- c.jeely

I normally immediately avoid huge releases, keep it punchy (even if the music isn’t) I reckon. But I’ve really enjoyed just chucking this on shuffle and dipping in and out of as much or as little as I feel like. Tasty ambient dub kind of thing. I like the sound of it in the literal sense and the conceptual one.

Dettinger – Intershop (Kompakt)

Not at all a recent release, but I loved revisiting this recently. The remaster on Bandcamp sounds cracking.

I bought this at the Kompakt shop in Köln in 1999 and listened to it on my Discman as I travelled across Europe by train. So really nice memories there, which surely contributed to how much this blew me away, influenced my own music making and has continued to make me happy over decades. Track six is one of my favourite pieces of music.

There’s a thread of contemporary stuff I like (c.f. those xphresh remixes of Purelink 👆) that picks up from where folks like Dettinger left off, whether it’s coincidence or influence. I bought Jan Jelinek’s first album as Gramm at the Kompakt shop too, and I’m hearing that loungier end of his sound these days too. I listened to some really relevant thoughts from Kode 9 about how music actually develops, which I really agree with. It’s not a straight line.

Womb – Feeling Like Helium (Sonorous Circle & Arcade Recordings)

I never quite got Womb’s 2018 debut album (“got” in either sense!) but this single stood out and stuck with me, so four years late I shelled out and picked it up. It’s a beautiful song, but I reckon what probably lifts it for me is that re-played vocal part. The kind of thing I might expect in either some carefully produced pop or electronica, but being played live in the context of a quite loose indie band… it gets me in a way that this technical description probably doesn’t do justice to.

I secretly enjoyed breaking down the track “Griselinea Lucida” a couple of months back, so had another go with “Tonal Drift”. These are both off my most recent album, Room Tones. This time around I focused a bit more on how I went about writing, rather than just what parts make up the final track.

Ha, that title is verging on Stinky Jim. Here’s my whole Bandcamp collection, if you want to have a nosey, otherwise jumping straight in.

Adrien75 – 100 (self-released)

Ha, I’m contractually obliged to mention Adrien’s latest, since there’s a track on here called “Upton In Berlin”.

The album reminded me straight away of Adrien’s release back in the day on Move D’s label, where he was virtually/label-ly rubbing shoulders with Jan Jelinek, Moufang himself, and so on. The connections are the dusty hazy chords and dubbed out atmospheres and the switch between muffled drum machine beats and breakbeats.

It doesn’t feel like a throwback though – it’s also hard not to also think of the new schoolers who are on that retro cycle and bringing these sounds back, rejuvenated and exciting again. I’m thinking of that unnamed, loose collective connecting Kansas to Berlin (and Australia via Ben Bondy and also the Daisart label), names like Huerco S, Uon, Ulla Straus, Exael, and on and on.

Floatinghead – Live at The Third Eye (self-released)

My idea of tasty jazz. I somehow never went to the Third Eye, which I think is now shut? This reminds me of what I like from Sam Gendel, Sam Wilkes and associates. Super tasteful sparse synthy passages, a lot of groove from start of finish (never a shuffle), catchy melodic bits, and when it all goes skronk it’s welcome contrast. Horns from Lucien Johnson and Bridget Kelly are great, but it all works together really well. A great set!

Carmen Villain – Only Love From Now On (Smalltown Supersound)

The opening track with Arve Henriksen is so beautiful it’d be easy to miss just how good the album is as a whole. The insistent, ringing percussion and shimmering layers work so well with Henriksen’s playing. Easy to draw the dots to Jon Hassell but I also find it pretty distinctly its own thing. Elsewhere a lot of flute intermingling with the electronic beds and soft percussion. “Subtle Bodies” is another fave.

Bad Channel – INTLBLK005 (International Black)

Nice dub techno two-track from Harvey Sutherland and Kane Ikin, excellent Melbourne producers. Not sure what more to say. Sparse, warm, rounded off (not spiky), and every element placed beautifully to serve the groove. I wrote “sparse” to dodge the usual implications of “minimal” suggesting something abstract or cold, I don’t get that vibe from this at all. Sutherland’s love of house comes through.

Kris Keogh – Processed Harp Works, Vol 3 (Muzan Editions)

Exactly what it says on the tin. Northern Territory-based harpist and electronics bod, Keogh dropped the first volume of this via New Weird Australia 11 years ago and I still listen to it. Beautiful lush harp parts and really really digital managing of that acoustic source. Sometimes harsh and jagged, sometimes sparkly and dubby. The combination really really works for me, such a rich and beautiful sound source, and then the frisson created by the digital processing… something about that really hits the spot.

Yeah, I wrote “frisson”.

I made this video, breaking down the track “Griselinea Lucida” from my latest solo album Room Tones. It was a pretty interesting experience. I run software training as part of my day job and that set me up to be pretty relaxed while making the video, which I did record live in one take, and pretty self-critical afterwards. 😅

I never, ever want to be a “content creator”. But I do really like to share and I have learnt so many useful and musical techniques for my current music-making environment via videos. I was also partly inspired by Auckland musician Kraus breaking down his track “Candy”. This video is all about a relatively different way of making electronic music to how I do it, but it was still just fascinating to me and great fodder. I hope stuff I share and perhaps take for granted will trigger ideas for others.

I use software called Bitwig for writing music and I came across this modulators and oscillators challenge. I’ve written a bit of music following the tight rules on that page and made a wee video. They call it a “beat battle”, but that seems kinda hilarious given the rules involved.

The video and the music might be of interest even if you don’t use Bitwig and even if you don’t make music. I dunno.

The rules, from the page I linked to in the first paragraph, are:

• max one bitwig instrument track
• one note clip with max 8 bar length
• 120bpm
• one instrument of your choice
• max 20 modulators
• max 10 effect devices
• operators are allowed & desired
• unlimited note effects
• no 3rd party plugins
• bitwig 4.3 beta allowed
• selectors/layers allowed but you’re limited to one instrument
• no grid
• submit as *.bwclip

Phoebe Bridgers – Punisher (Dead Oceans)

I reckon more Bandcamp customers have bought this one album than have bought all of the 729 other albums in my collection combined.

I gave Punisher a go when it came out and moved on without a second thought, but then I watched a YouTube video from this channel Professional Musicians React where they had one of the three co-producers plus a guitarist from the band in the studio, and they tricked me into liking it. 😉 I’ve had this very ambivalent thing going on with this channel’s content for a while now. I sort of hate it. On one level, the stuff they gush over is exactly what I don’t, both in terms of their taste in music and what matters to them about the music too. You know, they’re enthusing about playing with Michael Buble or whoever. But on another level, it’s become my light comfort TV, and I genuinely enjoy watching it.

Anyway, lyrics-wise I love stuff that sounds like a string of really, really specific recollections or observations. So it sounds personal, but the whole shifts from confessional-feeling to impossible to read in any one way. There’s often a strong sentiment there, but also a decent kind of mystery. Something to chew on.

Wet Leg – Wet Leg (Sub Pop)

Huh, I can’t embed this one from Bandcamp. Oh well, here’s the video for “Chaise Longue”.

I stumbled over their song “Wet Dream” first a few months ago and found it really fun and funny, then promptly forgot about them until I heard “Chaise Longue” last month… nek minit, I’ve played the whole album multiple times. It’s not one I’ve bought yet, because I’m paranoid it’ll have a really short shelf-life.

As well as the fun, tight music, I really like how the lyrics are kind of chatty and often refer to very contemporary stuff without ever sounding forced IMO. Most of it is pretty mopey, but the music typically isn’t at all. My current fave is probably “Piece of Shit” which covers those contrasts pretty nicely.

Flin van Hemmen & Jozef Dumoulin – New Dance Moves (Shhpuma)

So if I’m going to be honest I don’t remember why I bought this and I regret it. Stink. I listened to it through for the first time while walking around Blenheim on a rainy day. Maybe that spoiled it for me.

Jack J – Opening the Door (Mood Hut)

I loved that one Jack J song “Thirstin'” back in 2005, so when his debut album suddenly appeared all these years later I gave it a good four or five listens. But I didn’t “buy on sight”, as they say, and I don’t think I’ll revisit it.

There’s some sort of reggae numbers, some sort of jazz fusion ones, all in a very indie 80s vein … some songs, some instrumentals … just none of it grabbed me.

Dimitar Dodovski – TUN008 (Móatún 7)

Compared to Dimitar’s last EP, this collection of beautiful electronic instrumentals is much more focused on tuned percussion sounds and interlocking rhythmic parts. Those things are always there, but this EP seems particularly about that and just in general particularly focused. I don’t mean to make it sound like there’s only one thing going on here, because there’s a nice range of feels and tempos. For example “Do While Bamboo” bounces along with crisp drums and deep bass, while “Future Horizon” floats, with nothing like a classic “band” rhythm section to pin it down.

I love letting these things roll around in my head. Perhaps surprisingly I’ve found the EP really good driving music.

Ben Green – Lauchie Cox (Music Company)

I held off on buying this for ages, as I was pretty into it, but I thought it might be too nice-nice for me. Pristine, pretty instrumentals focused on piano, but a full one-man-band thing going on with clean guitar lines, soft electronic percussion, minimal basslines… all with a bright sheen over them. Something in here takes me back to, I dunno, Daniel Lanois, Michael Brook, the Real World label. It would be easy enough to dismiss this as just the noodlings of a decent enough instrumentalist making home recordings. I almost did. But at the start of the month I bought it and I’m really glad I did. It’s just sincere chill out music, I suppose.

Vlad Dobrovolski – Playbacks For Dreaming (Muscut)

So this album by a Russian producer was scheduled to be released on Ukrainian label Muscut. Given Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine, the owner of Muscut has said he really can’t release Russian music at the moment, so … now you can’t get it. I pre-ordered and still got the files. So I don’t know if I should even bother to write more about it at this point. I like the music, though.

AFTA-1 – _UNDFND (self-released)

Heh, I actually only listened to this album once last album, but its 19 tracks are enough that it showed up in my top 9 listens.

This came out in 2019 and I’m sure it’s a Karnan Saba recommendation. Kind of a beat tape I guess, but at the mellow and melodic end of such things. Definitely stands up.

Priori – Your Own Power Remixes (Naff Recordings)

I got this EP for the DJ Python remix. I knew and liked 3 of the other 4 remixers on the EP, so was willing to take a punt, but that DJ Python mix is still the stand out for me.

Priori’s own music is very specifically retro, basically pastiche of a kind of very clean almost-trancey-but-pretty-chilled techno from the early 90s. I think of Sun Electric, of Higher Intelligence Agency. I’m not that into it.

DJ Python often has a really 90s vibe happening too, but quite a different one. In this case, his remix puts me in mind of a really specific vein of instrumental trip-hop that I might be the only person in the world to connect up. Kind of bedroom techno and 90s hip-hop aesthetics crossing over. Things that showed up on Mo’Wax, like Plaid remixing UNKLE vs. Major Force, Autechre remixing Palmskin Productions, or that “Street Mix” of Innerzone Orchestra’s classic “Bug In The Bass Bin”. I don’t know if this remix really sounds like any of these things, but it makes me nostalgic, anyway.

The Humble Bee – Light Trespassing (Motion Ward)

Another month, another top listen thanks in part to being something I put on while going to sleep. 😅

Quite a few of The Humble Bee releases I know about have long evolving tracks, but this is 10 tracks and clocks in at just over 40 minutes. It must be a pop album! The opening track basically lets you know what you’re in for throughout: a gentle, tinkling melody slowly develops as it repeats, expanding from a tinny dictaphone feel to fuller, noisier layers of what sound like snippets of tape recordings. I think there’s a guitar loop and piano on top? Not sure.

On the rest of the album things are almost invariably very lo-fi, but deliberately so. Mismatched loops that pop and click each time they come back around, plenty of tape wobble, scuffing the microphone as a feature not a bug. These kinds of textures have been my thing for decades now so on one hand I did question whether I really needed yet another album in this vein. But, whatever, it’s a goodie!

I think of The Humble Bee as one half of The Remote Viewer, a duo I had a lot of time for around the turn of the century. So he’s been doing his thing for decades and there’s something I find pleasing about him showing up on pretty new labels like Motion Ward, among the kids knocking out new forms.

Various artists – Thanking You (Black Truffle)

This is two years old, but I just picked it up. Black Truffle is run by Oren Ambarchi, one of a handful of Australian experimental musicians who I’ve followed closely for more than a decade now, but I got here through investigating NZ ex-pat Tim Coster for AmbientNZ.com. It’s a really interesting collection and I’d say most of it is too weird and/or engaging to fit the tag “ambient”, although it’s almost all drum-free and electronic sounding. Sometimes if I’m listening on my computer I wonder if I’ve accidentally got audio playing from a website.

To pick out one example, Delphine Dora’s “quelque chose de hazardeux” is a track of many evolving parts, all of which sound like she’s played them. Things kick off with a lively and almost accordion-like keyboard playing a motif that’s almost like some kind of fairground organ thing, but this abruptly stops and starts revealing other layers of mysterious metallic plucking and bowing sounds. Then there’s a whole middle section where the track heads off into a long, different mellow passage on a different keyboard. Things routinely get pretty dense and dissonant and it’s the opposite of a lot of the more loop-based music I’m often listening to. Probably part of what I found refreshing about this compilation!

Various artists – Fundraiser compilation: ВОЛЯ (Muscut)

Hmm looks like the font I use on this site doesn’t include Cyrillic. “ВОЛЯ” (“VOLYA”) is Ukrainian for freedom. This is a collection of Ukrainian musicians, leaning heavily towards electronic and instrumental music. There’s a bit of a band jam on one track and there’s one song. I’ll admit I’ve hardly digested the compilation yet, but it’s diverse and interesting and of course I was happy to support the cause.

I started following the label last year, having got very into an album by the label boss Nikolaienko, and there’s now unsurprising waves of anger and dismay coming through my Bandcamp app. Muscut has released albums by Russian artists in the past and in fact I bought one recently, but as of now is suspending the release of any Russian music.

Sam Hamilton – Super Positions (self-released)

Free if you like. Hamilton’s from New Zealand, though based in America, and this album is another one of the things I’ve picked up in the course of researching and writing up AmbientNZ.com.

This is a really diverse mix of instrumental music, from a piano solo through a couple of field recordings and a 34-minute acoustic drone performed on harmonium and strings to langorously evolving digital loops of electric guitar. The latter is actually the opening track and it put me in mind of Oren Ambarchi back when he was doing solo but highly processed guitar music circa Suspension, without sounding like a knock off in any way.

I will say it’s a long album to listen through: an hour and 45 minutes is maybe an hour longer than my ideal album length! And two tracks out of nine make up almost an hour of the run-time, which is also a strange sort of lopsided feeling. But, hey, there’s also nine distinctive, interesting things to listen to, and they’re giving the thing away. So it’s definitely worth checking out, IMO.

Old Saw – Country Tropics (Lobby Art)

I got here via Adrien sharing this Aquarium Drunkard article, Cosmic Pedal (And Lap) Steel Situations :: Winter 2022.

Ever since KLF’s Chill Out I’ve been interested in ambient music that has touches of pedal steel in the mix and I think of this album in that context, though it’s perhaps a largely acoustic kind of ambience. I very fondly remember seeing Susan Alcorn play at Meow years ago and I wrote about Luke Schneider in one of these monthly round ups. While Alcorn typically plays completely solo and Schneider goes deep with electronic treatments, both severing the country connection, Old Saw is definitely a band and their music also really leans into Americana. Pedal and lap steel lines slide about on top of drones made with fiddle, organ, and guitar. Banjo and acoustic guitar buzzes and shimmers.

I really like all four tracks here.

Wild Card – Wild Card 2 (self-released)

Wild Card is a trio of Marcus Fischer, Paul Dickow (aka Strategy) and William Selman. I know the first two and checked this out off the back of Fischer announcing it. It’s four tracks of what I take to be jammed or at least performed soft electronic stuff, with plenty of foley-like percussive scuffing and susurration and what a workmate decades ago used to refer to as “science sounds” (electronic oscillations with lots of echoes). Unlike Fischer’s solo material I don’t hear any obvious guitar.

all light hits u – Moving, Rising (self-released)

Ooh, careful, I think all three tracks on this EP have drums. The opener keeps feeling like it might go into dnb territory, but it’s all hints and nods and never quite kicks off. Um, to be clear, I like it that way. Deep chords and echoing sounds, using the vocab of dance music to say something soothing and restful.

I found this release having picked up something by the trio Purelink last year that I really liked. All light hits u is two out of three members of that trio. I see Purelink just dropped a full album on Lillerne Tapes. They’re also affiliated with the above label Motion Ward, and the release is mastered by Shy (Uon, who has releases on Motion Ward, Western Mineral Ltd, etc.).

Julia Gjertsen & Nico Rosenberg – Paisajes Imaginarios (Constellation Tatsu)

I wrote about this last month and don’t have much more to say about it.

Kate Carr – dawn, always new, often superb, inaugurates the return of the everyday (Forma Arts)

I also wrote about this previously, when I’d been listening to it a lot last August. The only thing I’d add this time around is that I reflected how much Kate does stuff where she’s making noise herself. So although I tend to think of her music as being based around field recordings, in this case very location-specific ones, she’s sometimes almost like a musical foley artist. I don’t have any particular thoughts about that, but it just reminded me that even in something as niche as making music with field recordings, there’s quite a range of approaches and possibilities.

The above chart is based on number of separate tracks played during February, recorded via last.fm. Most releases are in my Bandcamp collection, Prince being the only exception last month.

Julia Gjertsen & Nico Rosenberg – Paisajes Imaginarios (Constellation Tatsu)

Not many new listens in the last month, but this is one and I thrashed it. I may as well be honest that one reason this’ll be at the top of the list is because it’s a good one for going to sleep – but it’s more characterful and also diverse than that might sound. It’s a collection of piano-based instrumentals, but often more rhythmic and sometimes hypnotically looping than you might expect if someone said “ambient piano music”. More like a Cluster record than The Plateaux of Mirrors, if those references mean anything to you. There are great chuggy synth lines too, such as on the well-named “Atlantis”. As a whole the album has a fuzzy, recorded-to-tape quality to a lot of it, which you might consider lo-fi.

Seaworthy & Matt Rösner – Snowmelt (12k)

These two released their first album in 2010, taking just shy of 12 years to release a second one. The first album was principally Seaworthy’s acoustic guitar on top of untouched recordings made mostly underwater. This one the concept is something about the sound of climate change, and I think there’s more electric guitar, in the vein of say “Albatross” or something, as well as more synth-y sound beds. The field recordings are still there, but not so baldly right there.

Helado Negro – Far In (4AD)

This is a new (to me) release that I listened to a couple of times via Deezer. But there’s quite a lot of tracks so it came right up the list. I got here off the back of listening to yacht rock playlists. It’s all very mellow with cool grooves and chunky drums. I didn’t find any of the songs particularly compelling, unfortunately, but I might try again later. I’ve listened to a few of his releases over the years and he did a great song with Mouse on Mars once upon a time.

Negro’s singing reminds me a bunch of Erlend Øye / Kings of Convenience, Ruspo, and one or two tracks actually had me thinking of recent The Phoenix Foundation songs sung by Luke Buda. So this Ecuadorian American reminds me of Norwegians, Brazilians and Kiwis. 🤷‍♂️

N Chambers – Air Example (Love All Day)

Norm Chambers / Panabrite released a new album in the last month or so and I thought for once I’d go back and give the albums I already have a listen, rather than reflexively buy a new one. I own two albums and maybe I was just in the wrong mood (all month?) but I found this time around these gurgly, slightly tropical feeling synth noodles left me cold.

Lord of the Isles – Geoglyph EP (Dusk Delay)

A great EP, with two beatless tracks bookmarking mellow technoish jams. I hadn’t heard of this producer before this release, but he’s been at it for years. One of those super solid releases where no particular track stands out, but that’s because they’re all good.

Paintings of Windows – Canvas (PseudoArcana)

Almost 20-year old debut of Antony Milton’s location-specific project Paintings of Windows, based around field recordings made in a tent at night in Paekakariki. It’s very quiet, while at the same time seems obviously part of that decades-long NZ tradition of strange guitary noise recordings which I think of as more of a South Island thing. I like the intimacy of this. It ends with a very lo-fi recording of a song, almost a blues.

R Beny – Eistla (Dauw)

I have a really strong memory of listening to this in a hotel room in Sri Lanka in 2016, which is two years before the album came out. 🤔 To be honest, I found the music on this album literally forgettable, revisiting it I felt like it was the first time. But it was enjoyable enough to give it a couple of spins again.

R Beny is part of what sometimes gets derisively called “houseplant ambient”, after YouTube videos where nerds set up their modular synths to gently burble with an attractive houseplant in shot. I bought this off the back of a split tape between him and Paperbark, which I still really like. But I haven’t found a release by either one of them that I like nearly so much.

Mirko – LP1 (ROOM40)

This was released in 2016, but I don’t think I listened to in Sri Lanka. 😂 It came up on shuffle and I ended up coming back to it. I haven’t heard anything since from Mirko, but Lawrence English’s ROOM40 label tends to serve up these kinds of releases that are on the verge of what I consider ambient, but just that bit weirder and edgier. Worth the price of entry for the immediate drama of “In Conversation” alone. But tracks like “One Hour” are indicative of that sort of ambient thing in a different way: it seems like it’s going to be straight up drifty niceness, then in the second half a fast and insistent bassline comes along and a bit of distortion. It’s not scary or anything, it just leans a little more towards rock moves than most beatless electronic music.

Prince – Sign ‘O’ The Times (Super Deluxe) (Warner)

I chucked this on while making dinner the other night and it ended up 9th most listened for the month! This is the first Prince album I listened to from start to finish as a kid, and I’ve probably listened through it more than a hundred times over the decades.

Like Bowie, Prince had a run of interesting and inventive records with some amazing songs and was no doubt very influential to many great artists, but … there’s actually only one or two of those records I like to listen to from start to finish.

“The Ballad of Dorothy Parker” is just an ideal song, in my mind. I’ve pulled it apart in my head over and over, but it also still hits me. So it technically fascinates me, but I also still just feel it and feel that it works as a song. So much is so otherworldly: the pitched electric drums, the glucky organ-like sound, the drunken chords, the roaming and random vocal parts (including the Joni Mitchell quote) and the way it all finally feels like it’s coming together just as it ends… Wow!

While the details excite me and have inspired me, perhaps the most inspiring aspect is that it reminds me how (duh) good music is almost independent of all the little details. A great track can be great because of the technicalities, great with its technical “failings”, or great in spite of them.