Log #182 - Welcome To The Penguin Cafe

Penguin Cafe Orchestra - Union Cafe Penguin Cafe Orchestra - Music From The Penguin Cafe  Tangerine Dream - Zeit Soft Hair - Soft Hair Brian Eno - Ambient 4 On Land Lift To Experience - The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads (CD 1) Two excellent albums spanning the career of instrumental chamber group The Penguin Cafe ...

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Log #181 - A Lift To The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads

Why have I not heard this stupendous album before? Loving the The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads album from Lift To Experience and I've only played the first half. Fronted up by Josh T Pearson I was vaguely aware of his original band but had never heard this, their only album.  This is the story of three Texas boys busy mindin' their own business when the Angel of the Lord appeared ...

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Log #180 - Adding The Mix To The Kraftwerk Mix

Kraftwerk - The Mix Brian Eno - Apollo Midlake - The Trials Of Van Occupanther Cluster - Zuckerzeit JJ Cale - Naturally Cocteau Twins - Four-Calendar Cafe The Mix was a double album of Kraftwerk remixes and re-recordings of previous material released in 1991. The band had recently returned to live touring after a 9 year hiatus and ...

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Log #153 - Large Clusters

Cluster I / 71 Cluster  II Cluster Grosses Wasser Cluster Cluster and Eno Beatles Magical Mystery Tour Beatles Revolver Grosses Wasser (translated as "large water") was Cluster's 7th (not counting the two albums recorded as Kluster) album released in 1979. Produced by Tangerine Dream's Peter Baumann the music takes a significant turn towards ...

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Log #147 - Ambient Excursions Across Suffolk, Sowiesoso and America

Brian Eno Ambient 1  Brian Eno Ambient 4 Magma MDK Magma Köhntarkösz KLF Chillout Cluster Sowiesoso After the excesses of the monumental Magma last week we wind it back a bit this outing at Bamyasi studios with some gentle ambience in the form of two from the four original Eno ambient series:  Ambient 1 / Music For Airports (1978) Ambient 2 / The ...

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Log #120 - Wales 1 England 0

Public Service Broadcasting - Every Valley Low - Double Negative Brian Eno - Ambient 1 William Basinski - A Shadow In Time The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age Of The Understatement Stars Of The Lid - The Tired Sounds Of Not much movement in the blog this week with just one new entry as I allow the subtle tones of Basinski, SOTL ...

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Log #119 - Alex Turner To Play James Bond

I hope you don't mind my click-bait title but he'd probably make a good one don't you think? Here Arctic Monkeys front man Alex Turner stars in one of his side projects, with Miles Kane, The Last Shadow Puppets. For all intents and purposes, with Turner taking on the majority of vocals, and his ear for a catchy pop tune intact, I think it is pretty much an Arctic Monkeys album. Wyclef Jean - The ...

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Log #118 - Double Negative, Double Low

The final week of the year sees a return to the ambience I have enjoyed over the last couple of months with the ever popular Tangerine Dream, possibly Brian Eno's greatest work, and a new album from William Basinski. I'm also giving the very lengthy Tired Sounds another spin and dipping into Low's current acclaimed album Double Negative. Wyclef Jean - The Ecleftic 2 Sides II A Book Low - Double ...

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Log #109 - The Cacophonous Glory of Caribous On Mars

Stars of the Lid - The Tired Sounds Of (CD 1) Stars of the Lid - The Tired Sounds Of (CD 2) Brian Eno - Music For Airports Manitoba - Start Breaking My Heart Jan Jelinek - Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records Mouse on Mars - Autoditacker With its reedy horns, jazzy keyboards and cymbal laden break beats Manitoba's classy 2001 album Start Breaking My Heart feels ...

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Log #108 - Lifting the Lid on Some Ambient Classics

Following a couple of weeks of tentative excursions into the world of IDM, electronica and ambient, I've gone full steam ahead this week and embraced 6 albums across the genres: Stars of the Lid - The Tired Sounds Of (CD 1) Stars of the Lid - The Tired Sounds Of (CD 2) Brian Eno - Music For Airports Emeralds - Does It Look Like I'm Here Jan Jelinek - Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records Prefuse ...

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On Land - Ambient 4 by Brian Eno

March 1982 and Brian Eno releases the final masterpiece from his Ambient Series. A guest review post by Ring Modulator who picks Eno's On Land album as the only one he would need on his Desert Island. At the time, I hadn’t heard any of the previous three albums, Music For Airports, The Plateaux of Mirror (with Harold Budd) and Day of Radiance by Laraaji (which Eno produced). So this ...

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Log #15 - Enofield - The Differing Paths of Two Iconic Soloists from the 1970s

Hey And Away We Go Through The Grass Cross The Snow Big Brown Beastie Big Brown Face I'd Rather Be With You Than Flying Through Space Some groove and beats this week with three compilations (two from the excellent Ninja Tunes label), world beats from the brilliantly named Up Bustle and Out (also from the Ninja label), and a DJ set of funk groove from Nightmares on Wax. But the no. 1 album this ...

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