Ambient music.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I've been listening to the Stars of the Lid's The Tired Sounds of Stars of the Lid. It's two discs of guitar drones, with some strings, synths and piano along the way. It's neat stuff, though not for everyone.

 

I also like what little of Brian Eno's ambient works I've heard. Let's talk about ambient music in this thread.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I expect great things from this thread.

[Nighthawk 0]

As do I. I'm quite the fan of dark ambient music, which is the same as regular ambient except it's aim is to create unease rather than ease.

 

I enjoy such dark ambient artists as Nurse With Wound. They may tarry close to industrial, but I would venture to call them industrial ambient, even though dark ambient is what they're usually called. One reason I mention them is to point out that they have some excellent album covers like these:

 

Another industrial heavy ambient group I like is Controlled Bleeding. Their sound I find somehow prehistoric, as if it would be what I would hear if I sat on the rim of a volcano under a red sky, pterodactyls swooping overhead. Which is good, if I'm in the mood for such things.

 

Of course, I would be remiss to discuss ambient music without mentioning the real Rick James, Aphex Twin. He may work sporadically with ambient sounds, but they, like all he does, are superbly crafted.

 

Speaking of techno ambient, kid606 is another name of note. The majority of his work is barely contained drill n bass explosions and experimental noise, but on the odd occasion he'll drop something mellow, it's quite good, surprising even, once you've adapted to his usual brand of insanity. The Soccer Girl EP is one of the most uniquely characterized albums I know of, but it truly works well.

 

Oh, and Boards of Canada too.

[Kinetic 0]

What of Brian Eno's ambient output have you heard? I heard one of the more highly acclaimed ones--the title escapes me at the moment, but it's something to do with airports or airplanes or something--and, well, he should've stuck with pop music, as far as I'm concerned. Seriously, for whatever the merits of ambient music might be, have you ever talked to anyone who likes the second side of Low better than the first side?

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

The second halves of Low and Heroes haven't aged very well; way too synth heavy and dated sounding. Eno's ambient solo work from the same period are a lot more low key and more to my style.

 

I readily amdit to being ignorant of most of this genre, as I've long shrugged it off as new age-y, Yanni shit.

 

EDIT: And to answer your question re: which Eno ambient albums I've heard, just Music for Airports and Apollo.

[Nighthawk 0]

You pricks are gonna sit here and talk about it when you've heard two albums between you?

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Get off Richard James' cock.

[godthedog 0]

somebody give me a working definition of "ambient music."

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Yanked from allmusic:

 

Ambient is a spacious, electronic music that is concerned with sonic texture, not songwriting or composing. It's frequently repetitive and it all sounds the same to the casual listener, even though there are quite significant differences between the artists.

 

It doesn't have to be electronic—Stars of the Lid use mostly live instrumentation, for instance—but what's quoted there is more or less true.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Hey, I like Boards of Canada. The subtleties in all the blips and swells require some close listening. I'm not really into ambient music at all unless I've got an hour to lay down with a good set of headphones.

 

Chunks of M83's wonderful album seem a little too informed by pop structures to fall under allmusic's definition of ambient, but I'd be willing to call that a recent high point of the genre.

[Guest The Winter Of My Discontent]

Would Manitoba's Up in Flames fit under this category?

 

I like Boards of Canada, but lets not bring up The Books.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I don't hear it in Mantioba, though M83 have their moments.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Fripp and Eno's No Pussyfooting comes to mind immediately.

[Slayer 0]

Steve Roach

[ArkhamGlobe 0]

I like Eno's Music for Airports, as well as Tangerine Dream's more ambient-like early outings (Zeit in particular). I guess some of Faust's stuff could be loosely classified as ambient as well. I guess there's much other good krautrock that could loosely be classified as ambient as well.

[Gary Floyd 0]

A whole lot of reccomendations here

 

-Merzbow- "Music for Bondage Performance 1 and 2" More ambient then noise

 

-Kid606 "Soccergirl EP"

 

-Tangerine Dream -"Zeit","Alpha Centauri","Phedra" and "Rubycon"

 

-Zoviet France -"Just an Illusion","Collision","Dialogue","Shouting at the Ground"

 

-Brian Eno-"Ambient 1","Lunar Soundtracks","Discreet Music"

 

-Aphex Twin-"Selected Ambient Works 85-92","Selected ambient Works vol. 2"

 

-Future Sound of London-"Lifeforms"

 

-KLF-"Chill Out"

 

-The Orb-"UFOrdb","The Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultra-world"

 

Cluster-"Cluster '71"

 

Kraftwerk-"Radioactivity"

 

Coil-"Music to Play in the Dark 1 and 2","How to Destroy Angels Remixed and Rerecorded","Time Machines","Unnatural History 1,2, and 3","Black Light District"

[Special K 0]

I think Bjork's last two albums pretty much qualify.

 

Future Sounds of London has some good stuff, but it varies from ambient to sort of Avant Garde.

 

A couple of SOnic Youths albums, most notably NYC ghosts and Flowers would count. Though I like their last 2 albums style much better.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

I think that most posts in this thread will be asking if bands in question count as ambient music.

 

Does Sigur Ros count?

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Very few of the acts mention are actually ambient, even if they display those tendencies.

 

Cheap plug for my radio show: I'll be playing Stars of the Lid this Sunday.

[5_moves_of_doom 0]

I think that most posts in this thread will be asking if bands in question count as ambient music.

 

Does Sigur Ros count?

I was about to mention them -- great stuff.

 

But really... when it comes down to it, I (along with the majority of the boards, it would seem) really, really can enjoy the heck out of ambient when it's *incorporated* into other types of music, but could only name about two or three straight-out pure ambient records that I would want to sit all the way through and enjoy. It's great and all, I guess, but it really shines when it's synthesized subtly into other band's music to just give some of their stuff ambient tendencies. Sigur Ros, Sonic Youth, Bjork, and a whole lot of Krautrock all incorporate a bit of ambience into their style from time to time, and it's heavenly, as long as they don't decide to become full-on ambient bands.

 

...But since I'm seeing Lou Reed live tomorrow... let's ante up on the props for Metal Machine Music, people!

[Nevermortal 0]

Women of the SS.

[Guest My Pal, the Tortoise]

Kiln - Dusker

 

There's some pretty good stuff here. The cover is a link. I don't know if it's too rhythmic to be truly ambient, but it makes for good passive listening anyway.

[Coffin Surfer 0]

Naked City's Absinthe might be one of the most terrifying things I've heard..and I mean that in a good way.

[Nighthawk 0]

Man, I completely forgot about Controlled Bleeding since mentioning them here. Thanks for the bump! I've been listening to them again and they're still awesome. My description up there of them sounding prehistoric remains apt.

 

This thread must have been when I was first getting into this stuff, I've sort of neglected it. I gotta get back into this shit.

[Gary Floyd 0]

No mention of Tangerine Dream, Cluster, or Klaus Schulze? Come on, the old Berlin School is where it's at.

[Guest Tzar Lysergic]

SunnO)) counts, I think.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

POWER AMBIENT

 

Stars of the Lid's And Their Refinement of the Decline is one of my favorite albums from this year.

[snuffbox 0]

Boards of Canada.

[... 0]

hbr1.com is a great place to hear stuff.

[Guest My Pal, the Tortoise]

My favorite ambient albums of 2007:

Stars of the Lid - And Their Refinement of the Decline

Andrew Pekler - Cue

BJ Nilsen - The Short Night

White Rainbow - Prism of Eternal Now

 

Puff by Blues Control never clicked with me. Too much tape head. I have a few more tracks on Dusker to hear before I can rank it.