Island Life

Hola. We got back from Fuerteventura in the middle of the night on Tuesday and spent yesterday in a daze of sleepiness, washing, needing a food shop, catching up with some Olympic action (which mainly we could see with either Spanish or German commentary over on Fuerteventura) and despair at what's happening in the UK at the moment (which obviously we had been tracking via phones while away). Hearing about other people's holidays is usually pretty boring so I won't go into too much detail here but you will find a lot of Fuerteventura photographs accompanying posts over the next few weeks. 

Fuerteventura is the Canary island nearest to Morocco, a volcanic rock in the Atlantic with year round sunshine, temperatures at this time of year in the high 20s/ low 30s and a constant breeze/ wind, that makes it possible to move around and do things without it feeling stupidly hot. We had a great time, our hotel was lovely and we spent many hours either poolside or on the beach. We hired a car and drove through the mountains into the centre of the island which was very memorable, the landscape completely desert like, and went to Betancuria, the oldest town on Fuerteventura. It was a much needed change of pace. I did spend part of the final day there wondering how we could stay for much much longer but, sooner or later, you have to come home don't you?

Easing myself back into the music and the blogging here are some tracks with islands and Spanish in their titles. 

First, ninety seconds of calming ambient bliss from Seahawks, followed by some longer, floaty ambient sounds from Future Sound Of London. 

Islands

Floating Islands (Yage Mix)

Now, AR Kane and a Spanish quay, from their 1988 album 69, a bewildering but beautiful mix of dream pop, FX and guitar pedals, noise and psychedelia. 

Spanish Quay

And finally, Slowdive and some dramatic Spanish shoegaze from 1994. 

Spanish Air

If you run those four together, in that order, you'll have an accidental but lovely way to start your day. 

Monday's Long Song

In August 1994 Future Sound Of London released Lifeforms as a single, an edited version actually ending up being played on Top Of The Pops with a none- more 1994 computer graphics video. Lifeforms was recorded with Cocteau Twin Elizabeth Fraser on vocals- but Liz ended up expressing some dissatisfaction with the final result, saying she sang her heart out for 'eleven fucking hours' but her vocal ended up sounding like a sample. FSOL's Brian Duggan disagreed. 

The full EP release came in seven parts, Paths 1- 7, sequenced as one long ambient piece. The original version was Path 3 (coming in with a tempo change at eleven minutes forty in the download below and the edited single version Path 4 (about twenty minutes in). It was also judged by the Guinness Book of Records to be the first to be the first internet download.

Lifeforms Paths 1- 7

Lifeforms is a very good piece of ambient/ ambient house- experimental, futuristic, ambitious and richly layered, a little time locked to the mid- 90s maybe but very enjoyable and engaging with tribal drums, birdsong, thumping kickdrum, tabla courtesy of Talvin Singh, piano and synths and multiple shifts in pace, tone and tempo.  

Monday's Long Song

A couple of Mondays ago I posted Reload's remix of Slowdive from 1993, ambient techno re- versioning shoegaze. This led to some discussion of other ambient techno remixes of shoegaze, two sub- genres that seems completely in tune with each. The common feeling was that one of the highlights of the sub- genre's sub- genre was Future Sound Of London's remix of Curve, also in 1993.

Rising (FSOL Headspace Mix)

This is a nine minute deep space exploration, ambient by way of grungy indie goth rock/ shoegaze. The Future Sound Of London pair, Brian Dougans and Garry Cobain, take their time and eventually bring the drums in to give the ambient backdrop some propulsion. This remix was part of a three CD single set, this one titled Blackerthreetrackertwo. Layers of sound, an ethereal female vocal, lots of early 90s techno sounds but without techno's harder edge. FSOL's remix was built on outtakes from the Cuckoo sessions.

I often feel that FSOL should have featured here more than they should, something I need to rectify. Curve have never been on these pages before, something that is a little odd. I bought their debut EP on release and liked a lot of what they did but never went that deep with them. 

In 1991 Curve released their debut EP, a 12" single called Blindfold. Curve were Dean Garcia (who appeared here on Saturday as part of Sinead O'Connor's touring band) and Toni Halliday. They mixed up a lot of late 80s and early 90s culture into a pummeling shoegaze/ Mary Chain/ alternative/ post- goth dance rock that struck a chord with fans and music press alike. The lead song on the EP was this one, Toni's vocals gliding over the top of a Reverence like rhythm and some crunchy guitars. Rapper JC- 001 contributes co- vocals. 

Ten Little Girls

The EP's title track Blindfold was slower and less frenetic but no less dense, a morass of swirling guitars/ FX, drums and Toni's vox.

Blindfold

Monday's Long Songs

David Sylvian's name has popped up in a few places recently, largely unconnected I think (although these things usually end up being connected somehow). I read about his solo albums in Rob Young's Electric Eden book, a long meandering trawl through British folk music and how in the 80s various people- Sylvian, Talk Talk, Cope- reconnected with visionary folk music in one way or another. Then, having moved on and semi- forgot about it he came back via social media and then came up in conversation with a friend who's a big Bowie fan when talking about Fripp. I dug a little into Youtube but didn't buy anything and again moved on. Then last week digging around Richard Norris' Soundcloud page, a proper treasure trove of tracks, remixes and versions, I found his 1993 remix of Sylvian and Fripp. Richard took the original track, Darshan (The Road To Graceland), a seventeen minute epic and remixed it, shaving a minute off in the process. An ambient opening section followed by a long, funky, experimental art- pop journey with a '93 house beat.



Sylvian and Fripp the turned up a few days ago at Echorich's place (linked on yesterday's post) with the dreamy two and half minutes of Endgame, ambient opening and then acoustic guitar and voice, which has sent me scurrying down a rabbithole. The Richard Norris remix of Darshan came out on a CD mini- album, only three songs long but well over forty minutes long in total. Richard Norris's remix, the original version and this ten minute ambient psychedelic swirl re-construction from the Future Sound Of London. Float on. Ambient special as i-D noted in '93.

Hypnotise Us

Two slices of early 1990s dance music to whisk us away from December and all those pre-Christmas irritations. First up is a song I've posted before but only recently saw the video for the first time.



Released by Creation in 1990 Dream Beam is a wonderful slice of house music, bleepy and spaced out with vocals from Denise Johnson. It was this song that got her the gig with Primal Scream and led to her singing on Screamadelica. Tony Martin's production is perfectly in tune with the times- he put an album out too, also called Hypnotone, which is worth pulling out from the shelf or looking out for if this kind of thing is your bag. Dream Beam is also on Creation's definitive 1991 Keeping The Faith compilation, along with Fluke, Weatherall's MBV remix, World Unite, Sheer Taft, Love Corporation, Primal Scream and a couple of others. Keeping The Faith is among the very best things the label ever released.

I saw Hypnotone perform at a mini-festival in Sefton Park, Liverpool (I think it was summer 1990). Larks In The Park was an annual affair starting in the early 80s. Famously in 1985 The Stone Roses and The La's played the same night. Hypnotone went on way after dark. We were on a grass bank across the boating lake from the stage and the bleeps came  from the bandstand, drifting across the water towards us, followed by Denise's voice. Everyone was very chilled and happy. It was one of those moments.

Dream Beam (Danny Rampling Remix)

I posted Papua New Guinea by Future Sound Of London fairly recently, back at the end of August. August seems like a long time ago now. This is another video I'd never seen before until recently, FSOL playing Papua New Guinea on Top Of The Pops in 1991. And playing it live. Papua New Guinea is one of those records that takes you away from it all.



Weatherall's remix takes things up several gears, a thumping kick drum over that throbbing synths and the rushing rewind sounds. Tom toms. Seagulls. Chanting.

Papua New Guinea (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Delusions Of Grandeur

Hardkiss were a San Franciscan trio who played a key role in the early 90s in establishing rave/dance music in the USA. At first they put on parties, promoting and djing, then moved into producing records and running a label. All three- Scott (God Within), Gavin (Hawke) and Robbie (Little Wing)- started making their own work which then got mixed together on their 1994 album Delusions Of Grandeur. This is a twenty minute segued sampler mixing ten of the tracks which make up Delusions... (which was remastered and  re-released in 2015).

1. God Within - ''Raincry (Spiritual Thirst)''
2. Hawke - ''3 Nudes Having Sax On Acid''
3. Drum Club - ''Drums Are Dangerous (Drugs Are Dangerous)''
4. God Within - ''The Phoenix (Rabbit In The Moon's Riverandrain Mix)''
5. Little Wing - ''Mercy Mercy''
6. God Within - ''Daylight (Dreamerdreamsalone)''
7. Hawke - ''Pacific Coastal Highway #1''
8. Rabbit In The Moon - ''Out Of Body Experience (Burning Spear)''
9. Unknown - ''Top Secret Song''
10. Little Wing - ''Thing (One)''



This being San Francisco things are pretty cosmic and hippy in places and by all accounts SF rave had a New Age 'spiritual vibe' (plus drugs) that marked it out as different. The trio saw Future Sound Of London's Papua New Guinea as the starting point for what they wanted to do and the album's tracks go from acid house to trance to breakbeat and techno. In places they veered close to the kind of mood music cds you can find in garden centres with samples of bird calls and monkeys but on the whole this is forward thinking, open minded stuff.

As a bonus here's their inspiration, FSOL's Papua New Guinea, a true moment of greatness. Counter intuitively, for something that works best as an extended track, this is a 7" version. Still epic and massive.

Papua New Guinea (7" Mix)

Papua New Guinea

Ok, last one in this particular run of posts- the extended, tranced and pounding Weatherall remix of Papua New Guinea. Future Sound Of London's original was more than enough in some ways but Weatherall redefined epic with this one in 1992. Are those seagulls I can hear?

Papua New Guinea (Andrew Weatherall Mix)

And just to bring us bang up to date this is Weatherall's remix of David Holmes's Unloved group and their When A Woman Is Around song, a highlight from the recent album- bass heavy and keeping parts of the spoken word section of the song. Out on 12" for Record Shop Day next month.

Expander

Future Sound Of London started out with their Expander album in 1991, a dance floor thing rather than their later ambient, off kilter, psychedelic voyage style stuff. The opening track sets the tone. Jumpin' and pumpin' techno. I can't quite work out if this sounds dated or not.

Expander