What are you listening to?

[Ross]

Yeah, they're an all-or-nothing band for me, I go through spells of listening very, very rarely, and then listening obsessively for about a month.

[epitome]

Finally about to get round to listening to the AA Syd Arthur remix album

[Ross]

Yet to hear that myself. Must do something about that...

Today so far: Kraftwerk - The Man Machine, Computer World, The Mix
And lined up: TD - Atem, Dead Can Dance - Spiritchaser & Anastasis, Siouxsie & the Banshees - Tinderbox

[epitome]

Illl & irma - Triangle EP

Really enjoyed their tracks on the two Touched compilations, so thought I'd give this free EP a try

[Ross]

The fact you're reading reviews of Turd Of The Tide scares me, you're not thinking of listening to it are you? Don't do it Ross, it's their worst release with Tyranny of Beauty being down there in the effluent with it.

Having given them a full listen now, I kind of see what you mean with Turn of the Tides - in some ways it's probably their most interesting release in a number of years, with the inclusion of the classical guitar, heavy use of field recordings, the vocal outro and the entire opening track, but musically it really is one of the most unnecessarily dull and uninspired things I have ever heard. Edgar and Jerome just sound like the backing band for Zlatko and Linda's noodling for the most part. Pointless album really.

Tyranny of Beauty was much more tolerable though. Some interesting drum programming for the first time ever, considerably less focus on indulgent guitar solos, and Catwalk is easily the best track of the '90s stuff by this point (I particularly enjoy the Underworld sample). Don't get me wrong, it's obviously still pretty mediocre, but it actually sounds like they were trying, for the first time since Lily on the Beach.

Will probably give Goblins' Club a listen at some point later in the week, if I can justify to myself listening to an album with that name.

[dell1972]

I find both of the albums a bit anonymously interchangeable. Part of the problem was that I think I actually acquired them both at the same time. Maybe I should just try the second one in isolation.

I actually stumbled upon a boxed set from this era that has been gracing my shelves for years with barely a listen. It's got an awful cover and called High Voltage - a name I think only AC/DC should be allowed to use. It's got two compilations in it Atlantic Walls and Atlantic Bridges, which I think are both a mix of this era and the Melrose years stuff. It's then finished off with two live albums from that era - Tournado (you see what they did there?) and Valentine Wheels. I may give them a go in the spirit of looking at the material from a slightly different angle.

Or I might realise it's all folly and for heavens sake don't torture your ears so....

I seem to recall Goblin's Club has some better tracks on it, and some dubious ones. I have very little recollection of it, other than it being not as bad as the other two. I still much prefer Transsiberia, Great Wall of China and the ultimate curiosity Ambient Monkeys, which is mostly field recordings from within a Jungle interspersed with occasional snippets of classical music and a few synths. It was originally played as warm up music before concerts started, and marks the point where Edgar takes back control of the song titles and gets all pretentious on us. "The Seventh Propeller of Silence" anyone?

[Ross]

Yeah, I would give Tyranny of Beauty another shot, it's definitely got some reasonable moments on it.

The one thing that I do quite enjoy about TD is how clear the evolution is - every album clearly follows the last. In this case, the increased use of guitar through the Melrose years to its peak on 220 Volts, then gradually being replaced by other instruments and eventually more focus on electronics again by Goblins' Club, through Oasis and Transiberia, until by Mars Polaris they actually begin to sound like Tangerine Dream again. Of course not long after that and Edgar loses any semblance of quality control and starts churning out CD after CD...

[dell1972]

I've got a nasty feeling I'm going to end up listening to them both again before long. Anyway, I've totally failed to mention anything on my currently playing list, not sure how much interest there'd be in some of it other than perhaps Seedy...

At the very mo I'm keeping it varied and distinctly far from the pulse of today's yoof:
Hawkwind - Space Ritual (never tire of this in all its manically psychedelic glory, and has an Electronic number on it that sounds like the Clangers)
Grateful Dead - Hofheinz Pavilion 1972 (for a band that died with their leader in 1995 they don't half put out a lot of albums)
Tangerine Dream - Ambient Monkeys (I blame Ross for this one...)
Joe Satriani - Surfing with the Alien (a spot of nostalgia for the over indulgent guitar solos of my teenage years)

[Ross]

I always fancied Ambient Monkeys as a record until I heard some tracks from it, and it seemed just really flat in comparison to how it was in my mind!

np TD - Zeit. I decided to listen to all of their records in order over a period of time; partially in the hope that it fills some sort of desire and I can start listening to other music again; partially because I'm reviewing them all on Discogs. Thought it was time somebody actually wrote about the records in their own context, rather than simply writing "this is best because it's from this era", or people unnecessarily comparing Pink Years stuff to their '90s material etc.
I think this will be the last time I listen to Zeit for a long while, twice in a month is more than enough. I feel utterly cut off from reality by the end of it.

[Pandemonium]

Hey Dell - nice remiders, I'm gonna play some Hawkwind and Satriani
I always liked Satriani's Engines of Creation

[seedy]

haha wow that's crazy

i actually listened to surfing with the alien just last week
i'm not even a big satriani fan either (i like his student vai better).....i just stumbled into the album on youtube and listened to it out of nostalgia



i'm sure i asked you before dell but i'm curious as to how you feel about PHISH
since dead/phish often get mentioned together n such

[dell1972]

Zeit does seriously make you zone out. I'm sure I read somewhere that John Peel used to put it on before bed time. Imagine the nightmares!

I've stopped listening at around about Time Machine with Satriani, not entirely sure why. I think I got more into 90s electronic stuff as it was happening at college, The Orb and FSOL and the like. I'm enjoying listening to the Satriani albums I had back then, so may give Engines of Creation a go, the newer stuff.

I haven't really listened to any Phish to be honest, it's kind of a daunting body of work. Sort of need a recommendation to start with to be honest.

[Ross]

Zeit does seriously make you zone out. I'm sure I read somewhere that John Peel used to put it on before bed time. Imagine the nightmares!

Mm, it supposedly 'cleared out' all the rubbish music he'd had to hear in the day. I think listening to that every night would give me some form of permanent psychosis.

My TD run-through has now got me up to Force Majeure.

[dell1972]

Blimey, you're not messing about if you're listening to it sequentially! There were loads of sounds from Force Majeure in Ambient Monkeys actually, the wolves howling etc, so it has kind of put me in the mood to give that a listen again. I love the prog wig out that is the start of the title track but then hate the cod classical pretensions of the end. When I first heard the album I was surprised by it as my exposure to that track was via a compilation which only included the wibbly bit near the end that they play live. There's a really good remix of Thru Metamorphic Rocks by Jerome Froese on Dream Mixes 4. Cloudburst Flight is lovely, I was most surprised to witness them playing it live about five or so years back. No warning at all that it would happen, Edgar just picked up an acoustic guitar when they came back on for the encore and started strumming the chords for it. The latter day rerecording of it was fairly nice and unoffensive if I recall.

I'm still listening to the albums I listed above, the Dead one is really very good actually.

[Ross]

Force Majeure is actually one of my favourite TD records, which surprised me at first as I'm not much of a prog person. Just such a solid record though. I've heard good things about Meta Morph Magic and want to check that out - might head to YouTube later.

Onto Poland now.