Low Light Mixes

The Mellow Side of Prog

2012-01-26T21:59:00.000-06:00

Back in 2007 I did a Prog Rock mix that is still one of my favorite low light mixes. You can find the original post & download here...PROG ROCK '07.

I've always wanted to do another prog mix. While on a pro rock binge I came across "For Absent Friends" by Genesis and that gave me the idea of doing a mellow prog mix.

In the original mix I tried to stay away from prog rock mainstays like Genesis & Yes & King Crimson. This time I couldn't resist some big names like Pink Floyd, Genesis, Brian Eno & Crimson. Those well known artists combine with some Cantebury scene music from National Health, Soft Machine & Hugh Hopper and Al Gowen. Most of the tunes are vintage 70's music, with only a couple newer tracks from Willowglass & David Gilmore.

I included kind of an oddball cut from Tony R. Clef. It's an acoustic cover of Genesis' "Undertow." He has a few other Genesis tunes that he covers on his YouTube channel here.

I know this mix is a bit different than the usual Low Light Mixes fair, but it was fun to put together and I hope you enjoy it.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Genesis - For Absent Friends
01:40 Pink Floyd - If
06:05 Soft Machine - Carol Ann
09:33 Genesis - Hairless Heart
11:45 Strawbs - You & I(when we were young)
15:40 Phil Manzanera - Diamond Head
19:57 Willowglass - The End
21:09 David Gilmore - The Blue
26:25 King Crimson - Starless
30:54 Brian Eno - Golden Hours
34:30 Genesis - Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats
36:42 Anthony Philips - Which Way the Wind Blows
42:25 National Health - Arriving Twice
44:35 Hugh Hopper & Al Gowen - Morning Order
50:57 Chris Squire - Lucky Seven
57:45 Soft Machine - Virtually Part 4
1:01:02 Tony R. Clef - Undertow(acoustic Genesis cover)
1:05:54 Pink Floyd - Pigs on a Wing, Pt. 2
1:07:18 end

The Mellow Side of Prog by Lowlight on Mixcloud

starry starry night

2012-01-14T15:31:00.002-06:00

"I, the fiery life of divine essence, am aflame beyond the beauty of the meadows, I gleam in the waters, and I burn in the sun, moon and stars."

- Hildegard von Bingen

Electronic & ambient music seems perfectly suited for stargazing. So you really could use just about any ambient mix for night sky viewing and it will work just fine. But sometimes it's nice to do a mix specifically geared towards astronomical awe.

It's always interesting to see how the song titles match the theme of the mix. Sometimes I pick tunes precisely because the titles match but most of the time it's accidental. In this mix we have titles like "Alpha Centauri", "Polaris", "After Midnight", "One Starry Starry Night" and "Encounter in an unexplored nebula."

As usual the music is a mix of old & new, with most tunes being from the last couple years. I was happy to sneak in an old track from Jean-Michel Jarre. Different from his normal berlin-school stuff, this one is a nice long ambient cut from 1990.

As with a lot of stargazing mixes, this one works well as a sleep mix too. I can testify to it's effectiveness.

On a side note...thanks to anyone who voted for Low Light Mixes in the Mixcloud best of 2011 poll. We came in 78th. Doesn't sound like much but considering they have thousands of "cloudcasters", coming 78th was great. Thanks for all your support last year & over the last 6 years.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Lunar Testing Lab - Paaliaq (I, Absentee)
01:35 Sonmi451 - Alpha Centauri (Time Released Sound)
04:40 Digitonal - Polaris (Leaves)
07:20 Diatonis - One Starry Starry Night (Diatonis)
12:15 The Winterhouse - Clearing (DataObscura)
18:00 Frederico Durand - El Mundo Secreto De La Montana (Spekk)
21:30 A Produce & Loren Nerell - Intangible (Hypnos)
28:20 Maps & Diagrams - The Infinite Delay (Handstitched Recordings)
30:45 Thom Brennan - Pulse
31:55 Aglaia - After Midnight (Hic Sunt Leones)
37:30 Sonmi451 - Blue (U cover)
43:05 Biosphere - Warmed by the Drift (Touch)
48:20 Jean Michel Jarre - En Attendant Cousteau (Disques Dreyfus)
55:10 The Civilized Electrons - Encounter, In an Unexplored Nebula (Databloem)

Starry starry night by Lowlight on Mixcloud

fire and ice - an Icelandic mix

2011-12-31T10:21:00.000-06:00

For such a small country, Iceland has produced a surprising number of excellent artists. From Bjork to Mum to Seabear to Olaf Arnalds to Sigur Ros, it's really extraordinary the amount of wonderful music that comes from that island.

This last mix of 2011 is an Icelandic journey. All the music is created by artists from Iceland. The brilliant idea for it came from loyal listener, Kevin. I wasn't sure how much music of Iceland I had in my collection but I was surprised to find quite a bit.

Icelandic music for me begins & ends with Sigur Ros & Bjork. They are both in the mix, with Jonsi, from Sigur Ros, making multiple appearances. In addition to the Sigur Ros tune, Jonsi contributes "Stokkseyri" from Riceboy Sleeps & "9" by Frakkur.

When Kevin suggested the mix & the title, he was thinking of Iceland as a land of extremes...glaciers & volcanoes, 24hr days & 24hr nights. This mix doesn't swing too wildly from one extreme to another. It's more ice than fire. A few of the tunes do build in typical post-rock fashion, but generally things are fairly subdued.

I used two Johann Johannsson tracks fairly close together, which I normally don't like to do but the IBM track just seemed to fit perfectly with the preceding cut. Plus I was just happy to be able to use that IBM track again because I LOVE it!

The pic in this post is from a terrific blog called "Stuck in Customs." Check out the blog or go to his Flickr stream to see some amazing photos. I'm a little tired of the HDR effect in photos but Tret Ratcliff does a really nice job with it & it definitely helps that he is shooting in unbelievable locations.

This was a fun mix to put together & I'd like to thank Kevin for suggesting it, I'm very happy with how it turned out.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Amiina - Boga (from kurr 2007)
06:01 Johann Johannsson - The Flat (from And In The Endless Pause There Came The Sound Of Bees 2009)
08:15 Olafur Arnalds - Himininn er a hrynja, en stjornurnar fara per vel (from Variations Of Static 2007)
12:05 Johann Johannsson - Part 2 Ibm 1403 Printer (from Ibm1401-A Users Manual 2006)
15:50 Stafraenn Hakon - Veggur (from Gummi 2007)
18:55 Valgeir Sigurðsson - Equilibrium is Restored (from Ekvilibrium 2007)
30:54 Jonsi & Alex - Stokkseyri (from Riceboy Sleeps 2009)
37:49 Sigur Rós - Álafoss (from () 2002)
46:15 Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson - Sudurgata (from Children of Nature 1996)
49:08 Bjork - Cosmogony (from Biophillia 2011)
53:40 Frakkur - 9 (from songs for the little boy 2008)
1:01:23 end

Fire & ice - an Icelandic mix by Lowlight on Mixcloud

I can hear the snow fall

2011-12-18T16:17:00.000-06:00

For some reason,when I think of falling snow, the instrument that comes to mind is the piano. Maybe it's from years of listening to Vince Guaraldi's Charlie Brown Christmas album. So it's no surprise that there is a fair amount of piano music in this "snow" mix.

We didn't have any snow yet but I had been thinking about doing a "first snow" mix for awhile & decided to throw one together Friday night. Then I woke up Saturday morning to a light dusting of snow on the ground. Maybe next I should do a mix for winning the lottery. ;)

As I said there is a lot of piano music in here. Led by Nils Frahm, from his excellent Felt album. A release that will end up on my best of the year list & one which everyone needs to hear. I think this mix works well as an early season "snow" mix versus the more bleak mid winter drones that will show up later.

I expect to crank out at least one more mix before the end of the year. Plus I'll have a year-end top 20 list, so start thinking of your own lists if you'd like to contribute.

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Nils Frahm - less [erased tapes]
05:20 Bernocchi, Budd, Guthrie - Heavy Heart Some More [Rarenoise Records]
09:35 Deepspace - Whisper
12:50 The Humble Bee - Sky Litter [cotton goods]
15:22 Willamette - Echo Park [infraction]
18:10 Pleq + Lauki - II (antonymes remix) [somehow recordings]
24:44 Cliff Martinez - Wrong Floor [lakeshore records]
25:45 Max Richter - eternal flowers question stars [Metropolis Movie Music]
27:48 e and i - Pearls for Alma [cotton goods]
29:40 Isnaj Dui - Always Close [hibernate]
32:48 I've Lost - in this cold, empty place [future sequence]
36:35 Diatonis - Whiring Above Our Heads
40:00 Nils Frahm - Pause [erased tapes]
44:25 Cliff Martinez - He Had A Good Time [lakeshore records]
45:39 Harold Budd - Three-Fingered Jack [darla]
47:40 Maps & Diagrams - Groghe(fort) [nomadic kids republic]
51:00 S. Carey - Rothko Fields [jagjaguwar]
54:50 Part Timer - seed collection [mobeer]
58:20 Nils Frahm - Keep [erased tapes]

I can hear the snow fall by Lowlight on Mixcloud

Vote

2011-12-09T08:21:00.001-06:00

Mixcloud has started taking votes for Mixcloud Cloudcaster of the year. So I'm basically shilling for votes.

If you click on the link it will take you to my Mixcloud page. Unfortunately there is no simple "vote" button. You have to "share" on Facebook to vote. I hate that. There are probably other cloudcasters I'd vote for but I don't like cluttering up my Facebook with random stuff like that.

Anyway, if anyone doesn't mind the Facebook sharing aspect, I'd really appreciate any votes you can throw my way. Last year Low Light Mixes finished surprisingly high.

Thanks for your support.

Launch of Curiosity

2011-11-27T18:55:00.001-06:00

This past Saturday NASA launched the Mars Science Laboratory known as "Curiosity" on a 9 month journey to the planet Mars. As I was watching video of the launch, I was thinking about music that would work well with a launch & space voyage. I quickly collected some appropriate tune & cranked out this mix at escape velocity speed.

The tracks are all electronic/electronica cuts that I thought seem to fit the theme. As it turns out, many of the tunes have titles that are perfect for a mix like this. Titles such as "Towards Unknown Space", "Solar Sailer", "Born to Fire", "Your Wings Make You Fly" and of course "Phobos & Deimos Go To Mars".

That "Phobos & Deimos" tracks was one of my absolute favorite tracks in college. I had a clear vinyl version of the Synergy album "Cords". There aren't going to be too many times that I can sneak that cut into a mix so I'm glad I got that one in here.

The NASA audio is all from the actual launch of the Curiosity Mars rover mission.

In the coming months maybe I'll do "Flight of Curiosity" & "Curiosity Lands" mixes.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 M83 - Another Wave from You
01:55 Boards of Canada - Dayvan Cowboy
04:40 Saul Stokes - Greys
08:25 Pinch & Shackleton - Monks on the Rum
13:07 Synergy - Phobos & Deimos Go To Mars
17:40 Brad Smith - Any Colour You Like (8-bit Pink Floyd cover)
21:05 Balam Acab - Apart
23:30 Jumpel - Lissabon
26:20 Daft Punk - Solar Sailer
28:25 Steve Roach & Vir Unis - Born to Fire
36:15 Delta M45 - Towards Unknown Space
41:00 Winterlight - Your Wings Make You Fly
46:20 Jumpel - Arles
49:25 Rena Jones - Helix
54:28 Plumbline - 66 w12
58:51 end

Launch of Curiosity by Lowlight on Mixcloud

drowsy

2011-11-23T07:26:00.001-06:00

I recently had surgery on a broken collarbone & had to spend a fair amount of time laying around, recuperating, sleeping. So I decided to make a mix that would work well with Percocet & Vicodin.

I've produced other sleep mixes before, "I fell asleep at my desk making this mix", "slo mo", "slow & sleepy", and have often relied on them for nighttime listening. Of course most of the mixes found here could work as "sleep" mixes.

This new mix, "drowsy", fits right in with those others. It's a soothing mix of drones & synth washes that will put anyone to sleep.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Benoît Pioulard - Drowsy
04:15 Ex Confusion - Bloom
09:45 Peter James & Disturbed Earth - A Descending Calm
13:45 Steve Roach - Slow Heat (excerpt)
21:05 Aglaia - Milosis
30:45 David Tagg - Wolf Suite II
34:40 Alio Die - Innamorato
42:35 Kyle Bobby Dunn - New Pures
45:35 Loscil - Stave Peak
51:15 Nest - Koretz's Meteor
55:55 Ursula - Un final decepcionante
01:01:01 end

Drowsy by Lowlight on Mixcloud

psalms & lullabies

2011-11-12T20:39:00.001-06:00

A friend of mine made an excellent Spotify playlist called "Atmospheric Songs for Travelers" which had some great music from John Martyn, Nick Drake, Wilco & more.(I saved it as my own playlist which is why name is on it if you click the link.)

Listening to that collection made me want put together my own mix of vocal music. I don't do vocal mixes very often but I thought it'd be nice to do one now, while all that music is swimming around in my head.

The songs are very laid back. Most are acoustic. Some new music(Antlers, Bon Iver, Horse Thieves) and some old stuff(John Martyn, Loudon Wainwright, Cat Stevens).

Somehow the mix ended up with 3 covers in it - Iron & Wine - Love Vigilantes(New Order Cover), Josh Rouse - Straight to Hell(Clash cover) and Radiohead - Wish You Were Here(Pink Floyd cover). All brilliant covers.

I have some leftover vocal tunes that might make it into a new mix fairly soon. Then it'll be back to good 'ol low light ambient. For now, enjoy this vocal detour.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Bon Iver - Flume(daytrotter session)
03:25 The Horse Thieves - (I was) Crazy (About You)
07:55 J. Tillman - Earthly Bodies
12:00 Josh Rouse - Straight to Hell(Clash cover)
16:35 Cat Stevens - The Wind
18:07 Damien Juardo - Beacon Hill
21:05 Johm Martyn - Let the Good Things Come
23:55 Radiohead - Wish You Were Here(Pink Floyd cover)
30:50 The XX - Stars
34:55 The Antlers - Corsicana
38:15 Bon Iver - Wash.
42:45 David Sylvian - September
43:55 Loudon Wainwright III - Lullaby
46:45 Iron & Wine - Love Vigilantes(New Order Cover)
49:50 Alexi Murdoch - All My Days
54:35 Red House Painters - Song for a Blue Guitar
1:00:20 end

Psalms & lullabies by Lowlight on Mixcloud

Shadowland

2011-10-26T13:48:00.002-05:00

Josh, from Nocturne Records, requested a Halloween mix.

At first I was reluctant because I'm not a big fan of dark ambient. I've never really cared for Lustmord records, although I do have "The Place Where Black Stars Hang." While I do have a fair amount of drone music, I don't like dissonant drones.

When I set out to do this mix I wasn't sure what direction it would take. Would it be noisy, scary ambient drones? As I was looking through my music I came across "The Twin Peaks Archive" by David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti. I thought, now there is some dark-ish music that would be cool to use in a Halloween mix.

Three Twins Peaks tunes made it into the final mix & helped establish a sort of film noir feel. There are definite dissonant moments but hopefully the mix is more creepy & shadowy rather than outright scary & annoying.

It was fun putting this together and I'm looking forward to making this an annual ritual.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Bass Communion - Ghosts on Magnetic Tape IV
04:30 Felicia Atkinson - Half-Blonde
06:10 David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti - Mysterioso 2
09:30 Ricardo Villalobos and Max Loderbauer - rethikhiy
14:20 The Caretaker - Friends Past Reunited
16:00 Grouper - Soul Eraser
21:45 Je Suis Le Petit Chevalier - Maine Jungle
23:05 DJ Signify - The Sickness
24:20 Julien Neto - V(Rivers)
28:45 Deaf Center - Hunted Twice
32:05 David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti - Dark Mood Woods
36:00 Deaf Center - New Beginning
38:45 Aidan Baker - complex iconographical symbology
44:25 The Caretaker - Dream Waltz
47:05 David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti - Mysterioso 2 (film version)
49:35 Bohren & Der Club Of Gore - Maximum Black
54:15 Earth - Dry Lake
57:00 Clint Mansell - Death is a Disease
59:27 end

Shadowland by Lowlight on Mixcloud

AUTUMN IN SLOW MOTION

2011-10-13T15:25:00.003-05:00

It hasn't felt much like autumn around here, with temps in the 70's & 80's the last week or two. But the leaves are still falling and before you know it we'll have snow flying.

So I figured now is as good a time as any to publish this new mix, "Autumn in Slow Motion." This is a fairly straight forward mix with a nice blend of old & new tracks. As you can tell all the tracks have the word "autumn" or " leaves" in the title. I'm pretty sure I've used the track by Eluder, "Autmun Hips", before but I just had to include it again because it's absolutely beautiful.

Normally I don't use my own pics for these posts, but the last two have been Low Light originals. This one was taken last fall on a photo hike through a nature park in my neighborhood. If you shoot a ton of pix one or two are bound to turn out.

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 wind
00:30 Shuttle358 - Dead Leaves
04:50 Eluder - Autumn Hips
10:10 Need More Sources - Autumn
13:15 A Broken Consort - Leaves
15:28 Shinichi Hirota - Autumn Loop Rain
18:40 The Green Kingdom - Autumn Toadlick
23:55 Peter James & Disturbed Earth - Autumnal Nights
31:45 Brian Eno - Dunwich Beach, Autumn 1960
37:45 Philip Sulidea - Autumn in Town
40:40 Spheruleus - Autumn
45:45 Jasper, TX - Through Dusk & Falling Leaves(Steinbruchel remix)
50:40 Aaron Martin - The Shape of Leaves
52:00 Tape Loop Orchestra - A Late Autumn
54:35 D RRadio - Leaves
58:22 end

Autumn in slow motion by Lowlight on Mixcloud

future days

2011-09-12T14:14:00.000-05:00

I guess you could call this mix "Televison Sky #2". It's a continuation of the sounds found in that mix.

This has more beats than a normal low light mix, more of an electronica sound. I think it has a nice mix of old & new material. The oldest cuts are from Can, Eno & Earthstar, 1973, 1975 & 1981 respectively. In the middle we have the Casino Versus Japan cut from 1999 & the Aspen track from 2000. Then there are a few newer tunes like the ones from Tobacco & Maps & Diagrams.

I was happy to sneak in part of a long track from B. Fleischmann called "Take Your Time". I listened to it recently for the first time in a long while & remembered how much I like it & knew that I had to squeeze it in somewhere.

I was also happy to have done the accompanying pic myself. It's from a picture I took in New York & then messed with in my video editing software, rather than photoshop, because I don't how to use photoshop. :( It's nothing great but it was fun to come up with something sort of original.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00   ATOM™ - weisses rauschen (zweiter teil)
02:44    Earthstar - Cafe Sequence
04:13    Brian Eno - In Dark Trees
06:15    Can - Future Days
08:45    Field Rotation - lichtermeer
14:55    Joey Fehrenbach - Don't Wake me
19:05    Aspen - Are You that Retail Snob?
24:05    B. Fleischmann - Take Your Time
31:03    Black Dog - Rainbow Bridge
35:07    Tobacco - Stretch Your Face
37:49    Casino Versus Japan - Warm Windows
42:25    Maps & Diagrams - Waking Up
44:25    Digitonal - After the First Death
49:40    ATOM™- weisses rauschen (erster teil)
53:22    Boc Scadet - Ganymede
56:10    end

Future days by Lowlight on Mixcloud

porch music

2011-08-19T16:27:00.007-05:00

"Several times I've seen the evening slide away. Watching the signs taking over from the fading day."
- Brian Eno from Golden Hours

This is music for sitting on the porch in the evening, as the day slips into night. The sounds of traffic, lawn mowers & kids fade away as the first stars come out.

I stole the title from a recording by Fognode, which you can find here... Fognode - Porch Music. Brian Siskind is Fognode & he has some fantastic albums that have been released over the years. Definitely worth checking out here... FOGNODE.

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Susumu Yokota & Rothko - sentiero (from Distant Sounds of Summer)
05:00 Fognode - Verdant (from Porch Music)
06:48 Jacob Newman - Whispering Pulse (from Against a Quantized Sky)
09:02 Helios - Eclipse and Nafas
14:10 Simon Bainton - Sun Settlings (from Sun Settings)
16:00 offthesky - waiting to fade (from The Beautiful Nowhere)
19:22 Brian Eno - Pour (from Drums Between Bells)
22:55 Fognode - West (from Porch Music)
26:43 Po - Morning Poem (from The Sound of Summer Silence)
28:45 Hisato Higuchi - ai no tanjo (from Dialogue)
31;14 Daniel Lanois - New Smoke (from Purple Vista)
33:30 Loren Conners & David Grubbs - blossom time (from Arborvitae)
37:15 Taylor Deupree & Savvas Ysatis - for a morning when (from The Sleeping Morning)
40:40 Frederico Durand - elin (from Elin)
43:30 Brian Eno - Real (from Drums Between Bells)
49:10 Rain Cloud - Fades Alright (from Kerala)
54:20 Fognode - Duquaine (from Porch Music)
59:10 end

Porch music by Lowlight on Mixcloud

graceful silence

2011-07-23T12:35:00.011-05:00

"Music is the space between notes."
- Claude Debussy

I found a couple of tunes recently that exemplify that Debussy quote. So I looked for more tracks that had definite valleys between the peaks of synth washes or long pauses between piano chords and then I let the mix take off from there.

The result is similar to the "breathing" mixes I've done before with the lulling ebb & flow that I like so much. This mix differs in it's use of piano & guitar tracks. There is a section in the middle where there really isn't a whole lot of "silence", more of an up & down of synth washes. But like happens so often with mixes, they just go places I didn't expect & then I've got to bring them back.

"Music and silence combine strongly because music is done with silence and silence is full of music."
- Marcel Marceau

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Antonymes - 311210 (from Like Rumours of Hushed Thunder)
01:38 Wixel - Vaarwel (from Somewhere Between The Sun and The Moon)
03:50 Danny Saul - Kinison part 2 (from Kinison - Goldthwait)
05:30 Good Weather For An Airstrike - Broken (from Winter)
11:00 Wixel - 10 minutes (from The End)
13:42 World Standard & Moose Hill - Graceful Silence (from Futari - Graceful Silence)
17:50 Stuart Dempster - Standing waves 1976 (from In The Great Abbey of Clement VI)
21:40 Kyle Bobby Dunn - Tuohy's Theme (from Ways of Meaning)
26:00 Celer - untitled #10 (from Compositions for Cassette)
36:39 Listening Mirror - Glass Slopes (from Spires, Spirals and Stones)
37:15 Jasper Leyland - they carry (from Sediments)
41:24 Dakota Suite - One Day Without Harming You (Machinefabriek remix) (from The Night Just Keeps Coming In)
42:33 Marsen Jules - Chanson du soir (from Herbstlaub)
47:00 Brian Eno - Neroli (from Neroli)
51:25 The Dead Texan - Beatrice part 2 (from The Dead Texan)
55:08 Antonymes - 291210 (from Like Rumours of Hushed Thunder)
57:16 end

Graceful silence by Lowlight on Mixcloud

Marsen Jules mix at ASIP

2011-07-10T09:51:00.009-05:00

I'd like to call your attention to an absolutely brilliant mix from the folks at astrangelyisolatedplace .

Ryan has been very kind to low light mixes over the years & I don't think I ever returned the favor. ASIP is a fantastic site for mixes & discovering new music. I especially like finding good, new electronica through ASIP.

This mix from a favorite artist of mine, Marsen Jules. His new release, Nostalgia, is wonderful. For this mix he "tried to assemble the material around the trademark sound of Kompakt's Pop Ambient series." This is a beautiful, flowing mix with one song bleeding into the next. It's is transporting.

Go here...isolated mix 18...to get it.

Multiples

2011-06-19T10:31:00.014-05:00

UPDATE: The first "Multiples" file abruptly ended at 57 minutes for some unkown reason. But it has been fixed & the full mix is now online.

I am a chronic procrastinator. Paperwork piles up on my desk until I am forced to deal with it because I can't see the actual desktop anymore. There are to do lists scribbled on scraps of paper all over the house, most of the lists unfinished.

With that in mind I present this latest mix which began more than a year and a half ago. Mick from the music blog, Subversion, had an idea for doing a cooperative mix. The plan was for each of us to do a section of the mix, each one getting longer by multiples of 9. So first two sections are each 9 minutes, next two are 18 minutes each, then 27min(although in the final version section 5 was less than 27).

Mick was good at holding up his end of the donkey but I would just putz & putz between sections. We had some weird pitch problem with a section & the whole mix sat dormant for some time. Then Mick sent me a revised mix with a new section 5 and we decided to just leave it there so it could get posted. If I had to do another section or two it may never be released.

It's kind of interesting hearing the mix after so long because it uses cuts I haven't listened to much since doing that section of the mix. That's a problem with so much good music that is constantly being released, I focus on new music & too quickly forget about music that is barley months old.

I'm glad that this mix will finally make it out into the world.

While you're out in the world looking for some of this music, head over to Entropy Records. The Buddha Machine Music cut used in section 5 is available there.

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T R A C K L I S T :

Section 1 - Muttley
01. Stars Of The Lid - Broken Harbours Pt.1 (from "The Quiet Sounds Of Stars Of The Lid", Kranky, 2007)
02. Steinbruchel - Home (from "Home", Slaapwel, 2008)
03. Richard Devine - Murman (from "Idol Tryouts", Ghostly International, 2003)
04. Grouper - Disengaged (from "Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill", Type, 2008)
Section 2 - Low Light @ 8:50
05. Strom Noir - Rusty Nails (from "Sen Zimnej Noci", Hibernate, 2009)
06. Fieldhead - I'm Fond Of Maps (from "They Shook Hands For Hours", Home Assembly Music, 2009)
07. Rhythm & Sound - Imprint (from "Rhythm & Sound", Efa Imports, 2001)
Section 3 - Muttley @ 18:00
08. Ateleia - Salt Horse Sculpture (from Formal Sleep, Xeric, 2007)
09. Foci's Left - Regurgitated Impulses (Spheruleus remix) (from Spillage, Audio Gourmet, 2010)
10. James Toth, Kerry Kennedy & Jason Meagher - The Time Machine (from Honest Strings, Jack Rose, 2010)
11. David Tagg - Pentecost 1 (from Pentecost, Install, 2010)
12. The Sight Below - Shimmer (from It All Falls Apart, Ghostly International, 2010)
13. Lawrence English - Droplet (from A Colour For Autumn, 12K, 2009)
14. Quosp - Deep Space (from Soundscapes I, U-Cover, 2007)
15. Eluvium - As I Drift Off (from When I Live By The Garden And The Sea, Temporary Residence, 2006)
Section 4 - Low Light @ 35:00
16. Loscil - Cello Drone
17. Listening Mirror - Not Yet Ready for the Day
18. Marc Codsi - A white rabbit in a hole
19. Mantsevich Dzenis - November
20. Taylor Deupree(I think) - rough
Section 5 - Muttley @ 52:30
21. Heidi Harris - Stolen Child
22 . Helios - First Dream Called Ocean
23. Enuui - Morality
24. Beatsystem - The Sound Of Two Eskimos Kissing(The Sound Of Two Eskimos Kissing LP, Entropy)
25. Fursaxa - Birds Inspire Epic Bards
26. Foci's Left - Ear Nest
27. Foci's Left - Stable Ghosts
28. Jan Linton remixes Fm3 - Zhongruan Ceng Yu (Entropy Records)
29. Danny Saul - My Escape
30. Implodes - Wendy
end @ 1:08:00

an uncharted sea

2011-05-24T14:25:00.006-05:00

"The loneliness you get by the sea is personal and alive. It doesn't subdue you and make you feel abject. It's stimulating loneliness."
- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

So much of ambient music has a beautiful ebb & flow that lends itself perfectly to sea metaphors. Whether its bobbing up & down on the surface or plumbing the depths, ambient music music seems to fit well with imagery of the sea.

I could crank out sea mixes just using tunes with water, ocean or sea references in the track titles. This mix does have a few tracks with obvious sea titles, but in general it's just another collection of tunes that have that "sea sound."

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 foghorn
00:20 Stuart Dempster - Standing Waves 1976
01:41 Dolphins into the Future - Memory of Self
04:45 Enrico Coniglio - pastor et nauta
07:40 Brian Eno - Invisible
10:20 Alio Die - Suono Ipogeo(part 1)
12:50 Echospace - Reflection II
15:00 Burial - Night Bus
16:55 Dean Santomieri - The Boy Beneath the Sea
19:35 Andrew Chalk - Ukigiri
21:15 Beautumn - Everfields
27:00 M. Ostermeier - Central
31:30 Deaf Centre - New Beginning(tidal darkness)
34:00 Riceboy Sleeps - Sleeping Giant
39:45 Dolphins into the Future - Lone Voyager
47:35 Enrico Coniglio - Da Mar
52:15 Stuart Dempster - Standing Waves 1976
54:40 end

An uncharted sea by Lowlight on Mixcloud

the stars above us

2011-05-11T21:00:00.001-05:00

"Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another."
-- Plato (427-347 B.C.)

I realized that I hadn't done a stargazing mix in quite awhile and with the weather getting warmer & spending more time outside, I figured a new star mix was in order.

So here it is...

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Sonmi451 - Cumulonimbus
05:30 Manual - As the moon Spins Around
09:35 Cyber Zen Sound Engine & Matt Borghi - Mars Infers
15:40 Robert Davies - Beneath Strange Stars
24:55 sgnl fltr - kwon
25:30 Frederico Durand - Mi Pequeno Mundo De Papel
26:25 Frederico Durand - El Mundo Secreto De La Montana
29:30 Staffan Wessman - Unison
34:50 The Winterhouse - Lost
42:50 Jonathan Hughes - Monoline
45:15 Kyle Bobby Dunn - Statuit
50:05 Loscil - Cheekye
55:50 Matt Thomas Wilson - Aviation Jargon
58:00 Jonn Serrie - Continuum
03:15 end

The Stars Above Us by Lowlight on Mixcloud

songs for staying in

2011-04-19T12:03:00.004-05:00

On the heals of the last mix, which was sort of modern classical, comes another neo-classical type mix.

I started collecting tunes for this mix after I heard Alva Noto's "Argonaut Version" in a Quiet Sounds mix. I like that song & wanted it to find a home in a mix.

Speaking of Quiet Sounds, there are some excellent mixes available for download there. I wish Brian would crank them out more often.

I stole the title for this mix from a song by The Tumbled Sea, which is next to last in the mix. It just sounded like a good title & it fit with the crappy weather we've been having here.

The mix ends with a sort syrupy tune from Anthony Phillips. It may be a bit too sweet but it's one of those tunes that I have always liked, goes back to college days. I don't know if I was hearing it for the first time now, whether I would like it as much. I'm sure a big part of the song's attraction is it's nostalgic significance. Anthony Phillips is the original guitarist for Genesis and back in high school & college I was a HUGE Genesis fan. Actually I still am, but that was how I came to Phillips' music back then. It was nice to sneak that track into a mix.

Make some tea or coffee & enjoy "songs for staying in".

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Anthony Phillips - Wind-Tales
00:35 Ben Frost - Extortion
02:37 Alva Noto - Argonaut Version
09:20 Rave Degolith - Orchestrated version of Aphex twin's Xtal
13:50 Jan Garbarek & Eleni Karaindrou - Fairytale
15:25 Deaf Center - The day I would neer have
18:00 Julia Kent - Seul, pendant un instant
22:10 Philip Glass - Islands
24:45 Brian McBride - toil theme part 1
26:55 Field Rotation - Acoustic Tale 2
29:25 The Notwist - Jonas
30:50 Akira Kosemura - Hicari
32:30 Dustin O' Halloran - A Great Divide
37:45 David Darling - Darkwood IV
42:25 Antonymes - a heart filled with emptiness
45:00 The Tumbled Sea - A Song for Staying In
49:48 Anthony Phillips - Sleepfall, the geese fly west
54:22 end

Songs For Staying In by Lowlight on Mixcloud

undiscovered soundtrack

2011-04-01T19:23:00.006-05:00

I love soundtracks. And if you look at the tracklist for this mix, you'll see that I have a few favorite composers.

At the top of that list are Clint Mansell & Cliff Martinez. They are responsible for two of my favorite soundtracks, The Fountain & Solaris.

Jon Hopkins, a new composer on the soundtrack scene, could soon join those two as a favorite. His soundtrack for the movie Monsters, got a lot of play here. I ended up using three tracks from that album in this mix, I just couldn't resist.

Actually I doubled up a few artists in this mix, Martinez, Hopkins, Sigur Ros, Nick & Warren Ellis, Underworld. Normally I don't like to do that but it just sort of happened that way. This is a relatively short mix but I think it works. Sometimes I don't make it to the end of some mixes, this way hopefully listeners are still in to it & focused at the end.

Enjoy this "undiscovered soundtrack".

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Clint Mansell - Winter Ghosts of a Future (Requiem for a Dream)
01:45 Jon Hopkins - Candles (Monsters)
03:35 Cliff Martinez - And We're Here to Listen (Traffic)
05:15 Thomas Newman - Still Dead (American Beauty)
07:55 Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - The Road (The Road)
11:30 Underworld & John Murphy - Searle Finds the Crew of Icarus (Sunshine)
12:20 Explosions in the Sky - An Ugly Fact of Life (Friday Nigh Lights)
14:10 Sigur Ros - síðasta ferð (hlemmur)
16:33 Craig Armstrong - Main Theme (The Clearing)
17:40 Ennio Morricone - Tema di Ali (The Battle of Algiers)
21:32 John Zorn - Family Found(cello) (Family Found(Filmworks XII))
23:50 Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - Micro Sucker (White Lunar)
24:25 Underworld - Capa's Last Transmission Home (Sunshine)
26:10 Sigur Ros - fyrsta ferð (hlemmur)
28:25 Hilmar Hilmarsson - I Flew (Angels of the Universe)
30:25 Cliff Martinez - First Drive Home (First Snow)
30:50 Jon Hopkins - Water (Monsters)
31:55 James Newton Howard - I'm Sorry (I am Legend)
33:50 Jon Hopkins - Campfire (Monsters)
36:11 end

Undiscovered Soundtrack by Lowlight on Mixcloud

evening sky

2011-03-24T16:17:00.007-05:00

As the days get longer, I am able to enjoy a bit of sunlight when I get home from work. There have been a few days recently where I stopped during a walk to gaze at the evening sky as the color deepens to indigo & the stars first start appearing.

Being a music geek, I can't help but think of tunes that would make a nice soundtrack for that scene. So while listening to music the last couple of weeks, if I came across a cut that made me think of those walks & the sky, I'd throw them into a folder for later use.

This mix "evening sky" is the result. It's not meant to change musically as the evening sky changes. It's just a collection of songs that reminded me of the sky as it darkens in early evening.

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 John Murphy - Mercury
00:47 The Sleepy Vines - Kelp Forest
02:00 Rim - Gusts of Sand
04:50 I've Lost - Absence
08:00 Emanuele Errante - Made to Give
11:45 Pjusk - sus
14:55 Brian Eno - Late Anthropocene
19:40 Shaula - Night & Green Grass
25:15 Marc Barreca - Fish Culture
27:50 Frederico Durand - Pudu Tu Nombre Es Tobias
32:10 Sonmi451 - Green
38:51 Alio Die - In the Labyrinth Garden
43:30 Mark Rushton - Fieldsketch
46:35 Emanuel Errante - Dorians Mirror
51:40 Wixel - Cloud Formation
1:00:00 end

Evening Sky by Lowlight on Mixcloud

Venice

2011-03-10T14:00:00.008-06:00

I am very excited to present this next mix. It's a guest mix by longtime listener/downloader, Ron Sylvester.

Ron was the inspiration for a couple of my mixes that used old 78rpm recordings as a basis for the mixes "Sustain & Decay" and "Revenants of the Past". Ron sent me some mix cd's which I really enjoyed & I told him he really should do a proper mix someday.

Well, I am delighted that Ron has allowed me to present his first mix here for everyone to enjoy. It's a wonderful sonic journey. I'll let Ron describe the mix...

"A week or so ago I stumbled upon the album Salicornie Areavirus by Enrico Coniglio; his website says the album is meant to be a sort of ‘collection of "sound tales" dedicated to Venice’. I thought I recognized his name from somewhere, and back-tracked it to a Lost Children netlabel release featuring Italian artists entitled Underwater Noises, which had been curated by Coniglio. Two other Lost Children Releases featuring Italian artists, Con Fuoco d'Occhi un Nostalgico Lupo volumes I and II, gave me most of what I needed to complete the mix. I finished it off with work by Ulises Conti, Lodovico Einaudi, Paolo Fresu, a Sub Rosa compilation of ritual music entitled Illuminated, and a handful of ambience from Soundtransit and the storehouse of opera 78s at archive.org.

Anyhow, for me this mix is simply entitled Venice, though the musicians are not necessarily from Venice, nor are the field recordings strictly from Venice. Apart from Nguen Le, who is playing with Paolo Fresu (who is Sardinian), I think all the artists or field recording locales are at least Italian. Actually, now that I think of it, the recordings from Illuminated are not necessarily Italian. Catholic, though; that’s something. At any rate, and as usual, the mix is more about a sort of Venetian feeling: canals, Carnevale, the Grand Lagoon, a certain slow sinking. I’ve never been to Venice, though, so what do I know about it?

I was really taken by Enrico Coniglio’s album and it sort of got this mix started. Here’s his website, but as in all things ambient, you are probably way ahead of me on this:

http://www.enricoconiglio.com/

Here are the links for the Lost Children compilations:

http://www.archive.org/details/Lc-eph01UnderwaterNoises

http://www.archive.org/details/TheSilentBallet-ItalianCompilation-ConFuocoDocchiUnNostalgico

http://www.archive.org/details/TheSilentBallet-ItalianCompilation-ConFuocoDocchiUnNostalgico_90

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Ron says "The track list is as follows; some editing of tracks has been done in the mix, and I processed the bejeezus out of La Traviata. There’s a lot of overlap in this mix."

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 venice canal - derek holzer [soundtransit]
00:12 salicornie - enrico coniglio
03:10 bells in Fiesole - thomas andre [soundtransit]
03.13 chioma - obsil
03:57 excerpt from la traviata - lucrezia bori
04: 02 tocco libero - tiziano milani
07:14 alpen tower - enrico coniglio
12:35 pagetos - francesco giannico / luca mauri / matteo uggeri
19:15 hopeless - passo uno
26:15 medio evo tecnologico - folk cinema [soundtransit]
26:45 restless - ornitology
26:47 in prinicipio - unknown from illuminated
27:12 gloria - unknown from illuminated
32:18 girl from murania - enrico coniglio
37:00 half water - allessio ballerini
40:20 el dolor implicito de la belleza - ulises conti
43:15 palermo without hands - folk cinema [soundtransit]
44:00 fish market ambience - palix [soundtransit]
44: 05 andare - lodovico einaudi
50:50 salicornie (reprise) - enrico coniglio
54:50 hydrocoma - un vortice di bassa pressione
55:45 lacrima christi - paolo fresu and nguen le
56:10 night sea - marco caorle
58:45 venice canal (reprise) - derek holzer

Venice by Lowlight on Mixcloud

distant transmissions

2011-03-04T16:17:00.007-06:00

"Distant transmissions flicker and fade, there's a drift on the signal, a ghost in the phase."

I've had that phrase on my blog profile for a long time. I've used different parts of it as titles for my series of 'shortwave' mixes(drift on the signal, ghost in the phase, flicker & fade).

With this mix I've completely tapped out that slogan because the new mix is called "distant transmissions."

I'm not really sure exactly how I came up with that line. I remember going through shortwave terms looking for a title for the first shortwave mix & I came across the phrase "drift on the signal". I liked the sound of that & used it for the first mix. Somewhere along the line I also read the term "ghost in the phase" & then just combined those two with other terms to come up with that short phrase which I liked because it's as close as I'm ever going to get to writing a lyric of any sort.

This mix, like the others, makes use of the wonderful shortwave recordings of Myke Weiskopf. Check out his blog here... for lots of streaming audio & downloadable goodies. I've done 5 mixes featuring Myke's work & none of them would have been possible without his documentary series. Huge thanks to Myke for all his fine recordings. Check out the ShortWaveMusic Facebook page too.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Ionoscatter_Unmodulated_Signal_And_Meteor_Whistles_6-2-58
00:30 Radio Bulgaria(stretched & normal)
01:33 Max Richter - Infra
04:30 Benoît Pioulard - Passenger
05:20 offthesky - frozen fountain
07:20 upward arrows - ^^^^
08:55 Family Radio International
09:30 ??? - Traveling Light
13:50 The Humble Bee - 07 jan 2010
16:30 Christian Fennesz & Ryuichi Sakamoto - kuni
18:20 Freescha - baby Maker
19:50 Daizok - Shoreline VII
24:15 Radio Morocco
26:20 Area C - Map of circular thought
29:10 Juv - til
29:42 Max Richter - Journey 5
30:45 Inversz - Home End
35:10 Myke Weiskopf - You're Up, You're There, You're D
37:40 Christian Fennesz & Ryuichi Sakamoto - Amorph
43:22 end

Distant Transmissions by Lowlight on Mixcloud

Kyle Bobby Dunn Live!

2011-03-04T15:18:00.005-06:00

Kyle Bobby Dunn & Phantom Fauna Saturday, March 05 at 7:00 PM

St. Augustine Catholic Church
116 6th Avenue
Brooklyn, NY

I know this is late notice but this sounds like a great show for anyone interested in the music of Kyle Bobby Dunn. Looks like a great venue & it's FREE!

Here are a couple of questions & answers with Kyle from a NYC website...

You're performing at the St. Augustine Roman Catholic Church in Park Slope on March 5. How did you come across this space? Why did you choose it?

I live quite close to it and upon wandering around the quiet neighborhood one day I found it staring down at my pitiful ass. I was amazed by its sheer size and build. I think churches are an ideal space for my sound.

Back in September you played at the First Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn Heights with a small ensemble. What sort of instrumentation will you have for the March 5 performance?

This will be simply guitar arrangements and some processors. Maybe a little organ.

Enjoy

Quintessential Jazz

2011-02-26T17:49:00.002-06:00

No pretense of ambience in this mix, just straight forward jazz. I came across an interesting list here... Quintessential Jazz Songs.

The Jazz 100 is a list compiled by listeners of jazz24.org & NPR Music. It's kinda fun to read some of the comments because the listeners get very passionate about the list. Much of the list is very recognizable & some of the tracks I'd never heard before, so it was great to dig in & discover music I probably should have known about for a long time.

So this mix is just a quick compilation of just a few tracks from the list, with the exception of the Paul Desmond tune(it just worked perfectly following Take 5 with Take Ten).

Even though this deviates from from the usual ambient I hope you enjoy it nonetheless.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Miles Davis - So What
09:20 Ahmad Jamal - Poinciana(the song of the tree)
13:33 Duke Ellington & John Coltrane - In a Sentmental Mood
17:40 Lee Morgan - The Sidewinder
27:44 Dave Brubeck - Take 5
32:57 Paul Desmond - Take Ten
36:00 Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto - The Girl from Ipanema
41:05 Oliver Nelson - Stolen Moments
49:32 Wayne Shorter - Footprints
54:57 Bill Evans - Waltz for Debbie
01:53 end

television sky

2011-02-19T17:30:00.006-06:00

"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."
> _ William Gibson, Neuromacer

I love that line from "Neuromancer" & it's the jumping off point for this mix.

Now if I was going to do a true Neuromancer mix I'd use stuff like Autechre & other noisy, abrasive electronica. But this isn't really a Neuro mix, I'm not a big fan of later Autechre & music that gets so noisy as to be annoying.

In addition to that line, some new music I discovered at the end of last year got me thinking about an electronica style mix. The excellent music blog, A Strangely Isolated Place, posted their A - Z of 2010 list on December 27th. I discovered some great electronica like Lights Out In Asia, Tropics, aKido, Com Truise, Horizon Fire and more. I listened to enough of the new stuff to know that I wanted to do a related mix.

The mix is fairly straight forward but takes a different turn when it hits the two soundtrack pieces, "Kanada's Death, pt. 2" & "Monsters Theme", from John Murphy & Jon Hopkins. I absolutely love those two tracks & figured this was the best chance to incorporate them into a mix. They actually fit pretty well.

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Milieu - Ghosts In The Trees, Songs In The Breeze (Am-Boy Alternate Remix)
07:32 Horizon Fire - Passed out in a Datsun
11:40 aKido - Mrchf Thftr
13:10 Morgan Packard - Again
15:25 Jon Hopkins - Wire
19:50 Marconi Union - Stationary
26:20 Lights out in Asia - Attempt No Landings There
31:00 John Murphy - Kanada's Death, pt. 2 (adagio in d minor)
33:20 James Murray - Eleven(decades_mix)
40:10 Jon Hopkins - Monsters Theme
43:50 Parks - Perfect Silence
49:45 aKido - Carrousel
54:05 Tropics - Soft Vision
59:20 end

Television Sky by Lowlight on Mixcloud

slow & sleepy

2011-02-13T20:43:00.004-06:00

Yah! A new mix finally! I've been ridiculously busy lately(10 days at the Super Bowl) so haven't been able to do much mixing. Hopefully that will change.

This is another mix where the title says it all...slow & sleepy.

Pretty straight forward ambient with long, stretched out chords, slow motion sounds to suspend consciousness.

Many of the tracks used here are new or fairly new. A lot of good music has been released in the last few months. I'll have to dive in & come up with some new mixes. I'm sort of planning a neo-classical mix, electronic beats, classic jazz, mellow prog rock, etc.

For now I hope you enjoy slow & sleepy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Kyle Bobby Dunn - Remnants
05:20 Wouter Veldhuis - Satumaa
09:30 Celer - A Lifetime of Wasted Breaths
14:30 Grasslung - When We Were Young
20:45 Wixel - Melsbroek
22:15 Simon Scott - Silenne
28:00 Gareth Hardwick - London 220109
34:45 Alio Die & Zeit - punto di fusione
41:45 Danny Saul - kinison (part 2)
43:00 Listening Mirror - Cast Off
48:30 Hakobune - a yearlong thought
52:00 Stephan Mathieu - Minuet
1:00:00 end

Slow & Sleepy by Lowlight on Mixcloud

obscured by time

2011-01-01T20:13:00.008-06:00

"The passage of time is flickering dimly upon the screen."

I've called this mix "Obscured by Time" because it has that grainy, blurry feel to it, like looking through gauze. The once distinct events in our memories melt together like the washes of sound in this mix.

This collection was inspired by the two 2010 releases by 36, "Memories in Widescreen" & "Hollow". A pair of great releases that are at times haunting & beautiful. As described at 3six.net, some of the tracks "use turbulent sheets of white noise, alongside classical instruments to create an eerie, almost ghost-like quality."

All the tracks have that same noisy, grainy texture to them. Most are fairly new, with the Basinski & Jeck tracks probably being the oldest. I love going back to Basinski & wish I could have snuck in a track from Disintegration Loops. Guess that will have to be used in the sequel.

"Several times, I've seen the evening slide away,
Watching the signs taking over from the fading day." - Brian Eno, "Golden Hours"

Enjoy.

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T R A C K L I S T :

[00:00] Ous Mal - Marraskuu
[03:15] The Fun Years - Makes Sense to Me
[06:50] Maps & Diagrams - The Modern Century
[08:48] 36 - Geiga
[13:52] Erik De Cordier - Spadomur
[14:35] Tim Hecker - Celestina
[18:00] Ithaca Trio - Untitled #10
[21:25] The Humble Bee - 26 jan 2010
[24:00] Wixel - You're Inside Your Own Shadow
[27:40] 36 - Equassa
[31:00] Damian Valles - The Alphabet of Lines
[34:06] Philip Jeck - Wipe
[37:35] William Basinski - Melancholia II
[42:38] d_rradio - Death of the Fair Green Veil
[43:50] Tape Loop Orchestra - Tokyo Twilight
[45:50] Philip Jeck - Soaked
[48:12] 36 - Drifta
[53:18] END

pno 2010

2010-12-30T23:40:00.004-06:00

This last mix of 2010 is a mix that I did for Headphone Commute about 3 months ago. They were kind enough to ask for a mix & I was honored to add it to their great collection of mixes they post at their own site & at their Mixcloud site.

I realized that if I was going to post this piano mix I'd better do it now because the title is "pno 2010" so I need to squeeze it into 2010 before it's gone.

This mix starts with John Cage – “On a Landscape”, which is appropriate, because that tune is the reason I did this piano mix. I’d never heard “In a Landscape” when a friend linked to it on youtube. What a great piece of music. So I decided to build a piano mix with that as the jumping off point.

The other unusual piece in this mix is Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou – “Golgotha” by an Ethiopian nun living in Jerusalem. Her music is unique, it filters the traditional Ethiopian pentatonic scale through classical technique– in the end sounding like impressionistic jazz. Wonderful music.

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T R A C K L I S T :

[00:00] John Cage – In a Landscape
[04:15] Kyo Ichinose – Engine #5
[05:20] Worrytrain – Hospitalized
[06:45] Max Richter – Infra #6
[09:35] Nest – The Twelve
[14:00] Tanner Menard – Laws of Attraction
[19:50] Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou – Golgotha
[24:27] Craig Armstrong – Gentle Piece
[27:10] Ben Woods – Stare Out in Silence
[32:25] Gavin Bryars – My First Homage
[38:10] Kyo Ichinose – Lontano #0
[40:00] Chris Abrams – Christmas Island
[44:45] Arovane – Tokyo Ghost Stories
[49:50] Christian Fennesz & Ryuichi Sakamoto – Kokoro
[53:15] Andrey Kiritchenko – Agravic Illusion

More end of the year stuff

2010-12-27T17:44:00.008-06:00

Here's a couple more year-end lists & thoughts.

My 5 favorite Low Light Mixes of 2010:

Other fav mixes from around the web:

:papercutz - Dream Scores - a Headphone Commute mix
Subheim - Headphone Commute mix
Invisible Ink - An Ambientblog mix
Everything Old - a Quiet Sounds podcast
echochorus - chiekurspace mix
Marooned - a Harry Towell mix

Other favorites things in 2010 :

Tiny Desk Concerts - this is a series of very intimate concerts over at NPR Music. Whether it's Olaf Arnalds, The Tom Tom Club, Black Dub or The Red River, the concerts are always entertaining. There is video of each & the audio is downloadable.
Slaapwel Records - a small label that specializes in music to fall asleep to. All their recordings are excellent. I eagerly await each new release.
Filmography 2010 - one of my favorite online videos from the past year. The editor took clips from 270 films of 2010 & cut them to great music with great results. The first minute, where she remixes "Nostrand" by Ratatat with "Power" by Kanye West & audio from films clips, is brilliant!
Wixel - 12 Records in 12 Months - Wixel is Wim Maesschalck, who also runs Slaapwell. He set out on a crazy project back in 2009, to release 12 records in 12 months. He does a nice job of keeping the quality high & changes things up enough to make all the releases interesting. Not really a best of 2010 entry, but I discovered it this year & wanted to draw attention to an outstanding project.

Best of 2010 - part 2

2010-12-22T17:13:00.006-06:00

Yesterday I posted my favorites ambient releases of 2010. Today it's a few other year end lists.

I spend most of my time listening to ambient/electronic music but enough"normal" music sneaks in there that I thought I'd do a top ten list for pop albums. I'll also list a few recordings that don't fit into either ambient or pop.

First up, my top ten pop albums:

1. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - the vs. ep
2. Efterklang - magic chairs
3. Vampire Weekend - Contra
4. Ra Ra Riot - Orchard
5. lost in the trees - all alone in an empty house
6. Neil Young - Le Noise
7. The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra
8. Sun Kil Moon - admiral fell promises
9. Horse Feathers - thistled spring
10. Matt & Kim - sidewalks
11. Damien Jurado - saint bartlett
12. Black Dub - black dub

Some favorite single pop songs from 2010:

1. Paul Simon - Getting Ready for Christmas Day
2. Kanye West - Power
3. Janelle Monáe - Tightrope
4. Vampire Weekend - Cousins
5. Damien Jurado - Cloudy Shoes
6. Matisyahu - One Day
7. New Pornographers - Crash Years
8. Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More & Winter Winds
9. Jon Hopkins - Monsters Theme
10. Peter Gabriel - Flume
11. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - Life is Cinema

Some other favorites recordings that didn't fit into pop or ambient categories:

Steve Reich - double sextet 2x5 [Nonesuch]
Michael Daugherty - metropolis symphony & deus ex machina [Naxos]
Max Richter - infra [fat cat]
Maya Beiser - provenance [innova]
Dakota Suite -vallisa [glitterhouse]
Steve Tibbetts - natural causes [ecm]

Best of 2010 - ambient

2010-12-12T15:56:00.006-06:00

Here is the obligatory top ten list for the end of the year. I might do a quick mix before the end of the year to highlight some of the releases on the list.

It was another good year for music, although nothing stood out as a new trend or a ground breaking recording. Alio Die put out a bunch of excellent recordings that I'm just trying to keep up with. Under the Spire & Low Point each had 3 recordings make the list, all of them are excellent. It was nice to see Hypnos back on the list with their wonderful release, Herion - Out & About.

Another label worth mentioning is Audio Gourmet, a new netlabel that produces a ton of quality releases. Label owner, Harry Towell, also made the list with his own release, Spheruleus - Frozen Quarters.

The ambient best of list is a bit long so I'm not going to make comments about each release, I'm getting lazy as I get older. Feel free to add your own lists in the comments.

Top Ambient Releases of 2010:

36 - Hollow [3six recordings]
36 - Memories in Widescreen [3six recordings]
Alio Die - horas tibi serenas [hic sunt leones]
Alio Die - tripudium naturae [hic sunt leones]
Alio Die & parallel worlds - circo divino [hic sunt leones]
Brian Mcbride - the effective disconnect [kranky]
Christopher Hipgrave - Slow With Pages Of Fluttering Interference [low point]
Deepchord presents echospace - liumin/liumin reduced [modern love]
Gareth Hardwick - of the sea and shore [low point]
Herion - Out & About [hypnos]
hummingbird - our fearful symmetry [fluid audio]
Ithaca Trio - Tesla Verses The Night [under the spire]
Jannick Schou - Night [under the spire]
Kyle Bobby Dunn - A Young Person's Guide To [low point]
Maps & Diagrams - cubiculo [fluid audio]
Maps & Diagrams - Tintinnbulate [audio gourmet]
Marcus Fischer - monocoastal [12k]
Nest - Retold [serein]
Pausal - lapses [barge]
Scott Cortez - twin radiant flux [line]
sonmi451 - spectrum [u-cover]
Spheruleus - Frozen Quarters [under the spire]

subatomic dubscapes

2010-12-11T19:57:00.007-06:00

The term "dubscapes" in the title of the mix pretty much says it all. This is dub mix. I've used dubby style songs in mixes before but never did a whole dub mix.

Of course after setting out to do an all dub mix, I veered off course pretty quickly by including a cover of the Twin Peaks theme & track from Vangelis. I'd been looking for a way to work those two tunes into a mix & they seem to fit pretty well here.

The Twin Peaks cover is by Talvihorros. He has an excellent recording out on Hibernate called "Music in Four Movements". After buying the albumBen Chatwin(Talvihorros) was kind enough to send me a copy of his version of the Twin Peaks theme. I liked this version immediately & knew I had to find a home for it in a mix.

One track in the mix is from an album that will end up in my top ten list this year. The album is Deepchord presents Echospace - Liumin/Liumin Reduced. It's a double album with the first being great ambient dub/techno and the second an album of field recorded treatments made by Rod Modell in Tokyo. An immersive record that I highly recommend.

The dub used in this mix is fairly ambient, especially towards the end where the ambient drones & washes come in & the beats slow way down.

Download (right click/save as) : 71mb, 51:20
subatomic dubscapes

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Fluxion - Field
03:25 Polmo Polpo - Rottura
08:55 Marconi Union - Temperature Drop
13:28 Talvihorros - Twin Peaks Theme
17:55 Deepchord presents Echospace - In Echospace
21:30 Vangelis - Antartica
26:30 The Orb - Slug Dub
31:25 Rod Modell - Mars Oil
36:16 Fluxion - Plain
38:50 Mokira - Lord, Am I Going Down
42:00 Wixel - You're Inside Your Own shadow
44:45 Sval - Valldal
51:20 end

in foreign lands

2010-12-03T15:54:00.009-06:00

I have always loved the sound of Djivan Gasparyan's music. He plays the duduk, a double reed instrument related to the oboe. It's got a great melancholy, other-worldy feel to it.

I took the "other-wordly" idea to make a mix of music that is vaguely foreign sounding, at least foreign to my American ears. The music is Middle Eastern, Asian, African, Eastern European and Indian.

I go back to a familiar source for some of the sounds, the Shortwave Music blog of Myke Weiskopf. Whether it's the night call to prayer in Bulgaria or Qur’an recitation from BSKSA Saudi Arabia, Myke has great recordings that everyone should take the time to investigate.

The times in the tracklist are rough. Sometimes there are two or three tracks playing at once & not all are listed in the tracklist. I also messed with a few tracks, adding stretched audio as a backing track or adding reverb.

At various times haunting, beautiful, calming or hypnotic, the music in this mix will hopefully stir your imagination.

Download (right click/save as) : 51:14, 74mb
in foreign lands

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Djivan Gasparyan - You have to come back to me
02:22 Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan & Michael Brook - Night Song
06:20 Hildegard Westerkamp - Gently Penetrating
07:00 Night call to prayer in Draginovo, Bulgaria
09:20 Peter Nooten & Michael Brook - Suddenly II
10:25 Maya Beiser - I was there
15:00 harmonic fx
15:50 Gamelan Madu Sari - thinly roundly
18:15 Ayub Ogada - Kothbiro
22:00 Jon Hassell - Frontiera
22:30 Hildegard Westerkamp - Into the labyrinth
22:55 Geir Jenssen - Camp 2, world music on the radio
23:30 Gamelan Madu Sari - Dreams he is a ball of fire or a hummingbird
26:30 Peter Gabriel - Wall of Breath
28:15 Galata Mevlevi - Nay Taksim
29:40 Hildegard Westerkamp - Soundscape of cities, Delhi
30:10 Forrest Fang - Garuda
31:15 Jon Hassell - Tramonto
33:00 Qur’an recitation from BSKSA Saudi Arabia
34:20 Lamp of the Universe - Heru, part 1
36:55 U Srinivas & Michael Brook - Think
41:30 Anouar Brahem - L'oiseau
45:45 Djivan Gasparyan - dle vaman
49:30 Peter Gabriel - A sense of home
51:14 end

positively ambient

2010-11-15T12:19:00.003-06:00

As most readers of this blog probably know, I cross-post these mixes over at Mixcloud. Recently I got a request from listener, TikTaalik. This is part of his post, "I was wondering if you could compile a mix that is optimistic throughout. The sort of ambience that I tend only to hear once or twice in a set. Can you get a solid hour of calm ambient music with a euphoric undertone?"

At Low Light Mixes we give the people what they want, so here it is...Positively Ambient. I'm not sure if all of the music qualifies as "optimistic" or "euphoric" but it is all calm & beautiful. I start things off with Eno's "An Ending(ascent)" because I think it's one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever written. Although it may work better as "an ending" than as a beginning, I wanted it up front so everyone that plays the mix is guaranteed to hear it.

I hope the rest of the mix doesn't get too sweet or too pretty sounding. I don't want it to dissolve into new age crapola. I dug into the archives for some of the tunes like James Johnson's "Entering Twilight" from 2000, Jim Cole from 2002, Diatonis from 2003, Fox & Budd from 2003, Jeff Pearce from 1999 and Stephen Bacchus from 1998.

The feel of this mix is definitely soothing, no dissonant chords to be found. It works well as sleep music, meditation music, , etc. Just good 'ole traditional ambient music.

Download (right click/save as) : 83mb, 57:30
positively ambient

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Brian Eno - An Ending(ascent)
04:00 Arc of Doves - Reverie
09:00 James Johnson - Entering Twilight
14:45 Diatonis - Winding Road
18:00 Hammock - Maybe they will sing for us tomorrow
23:10 Stephen Bacchus - The Returning
30:25 John Foxx & Harold Budd - A Delicate Romance
36:45 Jim Cole - Light Shines in Your Heart
43:10 Jeff Pearce - Daylight Slowly
44:45 Hammock - Three Sisters
48:50 d_rradio - Into the Morning
54:05 Quosp - Quosp
57:30 end

far from home

2010-10-27T14:53:00.006-05:00

Picture yourself floating in space. Whether you like to think of it as drifting alone, in a spacesuit, looking out at the stars all around. Or instead imagine yourself as Bowie said "Here am I floating round my tin can, far above the moon." Either way, the music in this mix should make you feel "far from home".

I like to envision a small craft in the middle of nowhere, drifting...waiting. Waiting for rescue? Waiting for contact? Waiting for main power to come back online? Hopefully the music will generate a feeling of weightlessness, of drifting in the vast expanse of space, without being too dark or dissonant.

I did not pick the tunes based on titles. I just did a quick sampling of some of my ambient collection to come up with possible tracks. But it's interesting how many of the song titles fit right in with the "outer space" theme. Titles like Meissa, Deep Sky Time, 1st Lite & Asteroid Dawn work perfectly for this motif.

Download (right click/save as) : 86mb, 60min.
far from home

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Lunar Testing Lab - Space Traffic Control
01:00 Brian Eno - Asteroid Dawn
04:40 A Produce - The Big Sleep
09:40 Harmonia - Weird Dream
11:10 Wouter Veldhuis - 1st Lite
18:30 Steve Roach - Deep sky Time
24:40 Austere - Lid
28:00 Mike Griffin & A Produce - Altara
31:45 Lunar Testing Lab - Paaliaq
33:05 Sonmi451 - Orange
38:45 Thomas Fehlman - in the wind
43:10 Spheruleus - Disintegrate
48:30 Fripp & Eno - Meissa
55:30 Sonmi451 - Blue
1:00:00 end

vox electronix

2010-10-06T14:43:00.009-05:00

I was playing some Boards of Canada recently & came across the song "In a Beautiful Place Out in the Country." I love the use of the vocoder in that tune. Being a sci-fi geek & an electronic music dork, it makes sense that I would like songs with vocoders. So I set out to find enough vocoder tunes for a mix. The result is "Vox Electronix".

The vocoder is is an analysis/synthesis system, developed in the 1930's, that dramatically reduces the amount of information needed to store speech, from a complete recording to a series of numbers. Because much info was lost in the encoding & decoding process, the voice ended up sounding "dehumanized" or robot-like. Eventually changes were made by people like Wendy Carlos & Robert Moog, that made the vocoder a musical device, used most prominently by artists like Kraftwerk.

The vocoder is used in many of the tracks in this mix, but I'm not exactly sure which ones are vocoder & which ones are auto-tune and which ones are just clever vocal manipulation. So don't everyone go crazy saying "hey that's not a flippin' vocoder!", I was just going for a certain sound, a certain feel.

It was cool discovering tunes I'd either never heard of or forgotten about. Thanks to Judd at the Hypnos forum for recommending the tune by Tonto's Expanding Head Band & for reminding me about the track from the U2/Eno collaboration, Passengers. Also thanks to Tobias(False Mirror) on the Hypnos forum for the heads up on the Robert Rich song. That's one of those that I think is some form of auto-tune versus a vocoder, but a great song. The mix opens with a cool bit of audio which was recorded at Bell Labs in 1936.

This was a fun mix to put together, discovering new tunes & revisiting old favorites(O Superman). I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Download (right click/save as) : 86mb, 63min
vox electronix

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Bell Labs 1936 - Voice of Power
00:23 Tonto's Expanding Head Band - Riversong
03:33 Brian Eno - And then so clear
08:15 Boards of Canada - In a beautiful place out in the country
12:30 Air - le soleil est pres de moi
16:30 Apples in Stereo - Vocoder ba ba
16:45 Bjork - Possible Maybe(Lucy mix)
19:30 Passengers - A different kind of blue
21:10 Robert Rich - Premonition of circular clouds
28:25 Laurie Anderson - O Superman
35:40 Ricardo Villalobos - Easy Lee
39:45 Trans Am - Futureworld
42:33 Air - Sexy Boy
47:30 Peter Baumann - This This Day
51:54 Apples in Stereo - Hello Lola
52:10 Black Moth Super Rainbow - Twins of Myself
55:15 Holger Czukay - Ode to Perfume
59:15 Brian Eno - Bottomliners
03:04 end

left in the desert

2010-09-28T17:28:00.006-05:00

These are songs that conjure up images of wind blown landscapes, tumbleweeds, sunbleached rocks, dusty roads and heat waves rising off the ground. Of course most of the music in this mix has an ambient/atmospheric feel.

I remember the first time I heard Daniel Lanois' use of slide guitar on "Apollo - Atmospheres & Soundtracks", I hated it. I guess I thought of the slide guitar as too close to "country music" which I definitely hated.

Well over the years I've come around on the slide guitar, I love it now. I'm still not a big country music fan, though I do have a ton of Johnny Cash recordings. I've come to appreciate the lonely, melancholy feel that can be expressed through twangy, dusty western music.

Of course the ultimate in great ambient twang is Ry Cooder's "Paris, TX" soundtrack. That makes an appearance in this mix along with standbys like Lanois, Steve Roach & A Small Good Thing. I was happy to sneak in a piano tune, "Alice & twins" by Japancakes. It just sort of fit with the overall feel & then the slide guitar comes in to make it even more "dusty".

Whether it's the twang of an acoustic guitar, the wail of a harmonica or the ethereal sound of a slide guitar, this mix will drop you off on an abandoned rail line in the middle of nowhere.

Download (right click/save as) : 77mb, 41:45
left in the desert

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Earth - left in the desert
00:45 George Winston - Farewell
01:50 Ry Cooder - nothing out there
03:00 Chas Smith - an hour out of desert center
03:50 Bill Frisell - lonely man
04:52 p.g. six - 6 for wire, strung harp with slide, with Steve Roach buried underneath
06:15 A Small Good Thing - drowning light
09:00 Daniel Lanois - Asylum
11:30 Steve Roach & Roger King - rain & creosote
15:30 Six Organs of Admittance - oak path
18:50 Balmorhea - Palestrina
20:10 Steve Tibbetts - kili-ki drok
21:10 Balmorhea - on the weight of the night
25:00 Esmerine - There Were No Footprints In The Dust Behind Them
27:35 Badgerlore - goodnight, sweet rabbits
29:20 Chronomad - aksak
33:50 Ennio Morricone - man with a harmonica
34:10 Japancakes - Alice & twins
37:50 Steve Roach - new moon at forbidden mesa
38:20 Loren Mazzacane Connors - lullaby (the 1st)
40:10 July Skies - branch line summers fade
41:45 end

silent sorrow in empty boats

2010-09-12T21:03:00.007-05:00

I have always loved a little known Genesis tune called "Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats". The last song on the end of side three(vinyl), it's a 3 minute instrumental that is more ambient than old prog rock.

I remember a thread at the Hypnos forum, a long time ago, that was asking for a list of the best ambient tracks by non-ambient artists. I can't find the list or the thread but I think I added artists like Radiohead, Daryl Hall, Peter Gabriel, etc. I think "Silent Sorrow" may be the best ambient track by a non-ambient artist.

I'm working on a mellow prog rock mix that I'm sure will include this Genesis tune as well.

Anyway, I've always wanted to use it in a mix so here it is. I used the track as the title for this mix but the music doesn't necessarily take on the sorrowful feel that the title suggests. I can personally attest to the fact that this mix works very for sleeping. Enjoy.

Download (right click/save as) : 84mb, 60:46
silent sorrow in empty boats

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Genesis - Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats
02:45 Slow Dancing Society - and to the dust shall we return
08:45 Alio Die - In the Labyrinth Garden
15:00 Christopher Willits - Flowers into Stardust
19:45 Pulusha - Isolation, pt. 1
29:25 Christopher Hipgrave - Time & Distance
30:45 Tim Hecker - Incurably Optimistic
35:45 36 - Lightout
37:35 Deepchord presents Echospace - untitled #5
40:15 John Foxx & Harold Budd - Raindust
45:25 Celer - A Lifetime of Wasted Breaths
49:45 Gareth Hardwick - 5 points
59:36 Genesis - reprise of Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats
1:00:46 end

footsteps

2010-09-05T19:08:00.005-05:00

One of my favorites albums this year isThe Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra . What first got my attention was Isabella Rossellini reciting the words of the late author Laura Huxley, widow of Aldous Huxley, on the first track - LookListenFeel. I've always had a thing for Isabella Rossellini so I gave the track a listen...and loved it.

I've been playing this album a lot and I wanted to feature it in a mix but the music wouldn't fit with my normal ambient mixes so I decided to a beat mix.

As with many mixes, this one took twists & turns I hadn't quite expected. It started off sort of psychedelic then quickly veered into something sort of funky, sort of jazzy. I love the detour it took to Dorothy Ashby. I discovered her 1968 album Afro-Harping at NPR music. I had already finished the mix when I heard the song "Soul Vibrations" and just knew I had to use it. It fits in very nicely. Somehow U2 & Dave Brubeck get squeezed in here as well. It finishes off where it began with The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra.

I really enjoyed making this mix & even though it's a bit different for normal low light fare, I hope you enjoy it too.

Download (right click/save as) : 92mb, 48:09
footsteps

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra - LookListenFeel
03:30 DJ Cam - Gantsa Shit
07:15 Polyoctopus - One Less Thing
10:20 Dorothy Ashby - Soul Vibrations
13:25 Conelrad - Charger Paris Mirage
16:55 U2 - Numb(gimme some more dignity remix)
19:35 The New Mastersounds - Drop It Down(b remix)
22:51 Dorothy Ashby - Afro-Harping
25:25 Chronomad - Dore Hindi
29:00 Terminal Sound System - Duchamp Falls
32:40 Dave Brubeck - Take Five
37:40 Hidden Orchestra - Footsteps
40"00 Halma - Hektopascal
42:35 Eliot Lipp - Real Tragic
46:00 The Maple Mountain Sunburst Triolian Orchestra - A Beautiful Walk in the Country
48:10 end

ambient A to Z

2010-07-30T19:40:00.006-05:00

I wanted to do a new mix but had no new ideas. I was staring at my computer monitor with it's big folder full of ambient music, all of it in alphabetical order. Then it hit me, I'll just do a nice, simple A to Z mix of a variety of ambient tunes.

It was fun because I ended up using some tracks & artists that I've never put in a mix before, such as Eberhard Schoener, Christopher Short, Nelson Foltz & Tom Lynn, Quosp, Ulf Lohman. Of course I also worked in old standbys like Basinski, Goldmund, Loscil, and Yagya.

I had to split the mix into two separate tracks to keep it from being 2 hours long. So part 1 is A thru M & part 2 is N thru Z.

If any readers/listeners have ideas for mixes please let me know. A few ideas in the early stages are and ambient vocal mix &/or slow/quiet vocal tunes, alien landscapes, slow beats, sleep tunes, progressive rock vol. 2. Anyway, any ideas would be appreciated. In the meantime, enjoy A to M (N to Z will be the next post).

Download (right click/save as) : 72mb, 57:00
A to M
N to Z

T R A C K L I S T S :

vol. 1 - A to M

00:00 A Produce - I Woke Up Dreaming
06:20 Bass Communion - Ghosts on Magnetic Tape II
09:50 Christopher Short - Twilight
12:30 David Sylvian - The Beekeepers Apprentice
16:15 Eberhard Schoener - Meditation part 1
22:10 Fabio Orsi - Lost Love
23:15 Goldmund - 25 thousand miles away
26:40 Hakobune - Melting Reminiscence
30:15 Irezumi - Endurance III
37:50 Jeff Greinke - Rolling Black Clouds
41:00 Loscil - Rorschach
48:00 Marconi Union - Debris
51:15 Manual - Last Light
57:04 end

vol. 2 - N to Z

00:00 Nelson Foltz & Tom Lynn - Still Life Vol. 3
05:00 O Yuki Conjugate - track 6 from Euphoria of Disobedience
08:30 Pan American - Lights of Little Towns
15:30 Quosp - Beechwood
21:50 Robin Guthrie - Harold Budd - a minute, a day, no more
26:45 Solyaris - Night’s Waltzloop
29:30 Tom Heasley - Western Sky
36:15 Ulf Lohman - untitled #11
40:10 Vir Unis & Christopher Short - On the Threshold of Eternity
43:40 Williams Basinski - Disintegration Loops 2.1
48:00 Xela - Her Eyes Sparkled and She Walked Away
53:30 Yagya - Snowflake 10
57:00 Zero Ohms - Unafraid of the Impending Silence
00:00 end

a vibration of strings

2010-07-23T12:22:00.006-05:00

I ran into the track "The Last Message" by John Murphy on a mix at A Strangely Isolated Place, and it got me thingking about doing another classical-ish mix.

The Murphy track is in there, along with new tunes(Maya Beiser, Max Richter, Nils Frahm, etc) and old tunes(Steve Reich, Peter Gabriel, Gavin Bryars, etc).

There's really not much more to say except that I hope you enjoy this collection of ambient, soundtrack, minimal & neo-classical tunes.

Download (right click/save as) : 54:55, 75mb
a vibration of strings

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 David Byrne - The Lodger
04:15 Maya Beiser - Memories
08:45 Max Richter - The Haunted Ocean 2
09:05 Nils Frahm & Anne Müller - Reminds to Teeth
13:15 Olan Mill - Country
16:30 John Murphy - The Last Message
18:00 Chihei Hatakeyama - Light Drizzle
20:30 Hummingbird - Starfish Seastar
22:30 Tarwater - Clock
23:30 Terry Riley - is in c in f (r. luke dubois remix)
25:30 Steve Reich - Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices & organ
34:50 Sufjan Stevens - Movement III - Linear Tableau With Intersecting Surprise
39:15 Max Richter - Infra 2
40:50 Kyle Bobby Dunn - The Tributary (for voices lost)
46:20 P Jorgensen - Palimpsest II
48:15 Gavin Bryars - Epilogue from Wonder Lawn
52:20 Peter Gabriel - The Nest that Sailed the Sky
54:55 end

breathe in, breathe out

2010-06-21T15:20:00.004-05:00

Breathing is a rhythmic process of expansion and contraction, in & out, inhale & exhale. Breathing is one example of the cycles we see in nature such as night and day, wake and sleep, seasonal growth and decay, tides going in & out. And like waves in the tides, the rhythmic nature of breathing can be very calming.

Some of my favorite sleep music has this cyclic, breathing quality to it. I made my first breathing mix almost three years ago. Wow! Has it really been that long? I can't believe I've been posting these mixes for 4 years. Anyway, back to this mix, I had a few breathing tunes that I'd been meaning to use, some old some new, and the result is "breathe in, breathe out".

On many of these mixes, there are sections where two or more pieces are playing simultaneously. But this one may have the longest section of combined playing. At about 4:30 into the mix, Bang on a Can's version of Music for Airports 1-2 comes in over the peter Broderick piece. The two continue playing at the same time until somewhere around 10:00, when Airports fades out and the Broderick cut goes solo for a minute or two. I wasn't planning on doing it that way, the two tracks just blended nicely.

There's a track from Foci's Left in the middle of the mix that is from a new netlabel, Audio Gourmet. The label has been running for less than two months but already they have 7 fine releases. Definitely take some time & download some these excellent EPs.

Download (right click/save as) : 87mb, 60min
breathe in, breathe out

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Peter Broderick - Music for a sleeping sculpture of Peter Broderick
04:30 Bang on a Can - Music for Airports 1-2
10:00ish Music for a sleeping sculpture comes back to the fore
11:45 Panoptique Electrical - Glacier Show 1
20:00 Porzellan - Rosen
25:45 Lucette Bourdin - Through Empty Heaven
31:00 Robert Rich - Never Alone
35:40 Foci's Left - Regurgitated Impulses(David Tagg remix)
37:10 Olan Mill - Country
40:30 St. Kilda - You are in Every Dream
43:20 Language of Landscape - Contemplating Departure In Wake of Clear Light
47:45 Austere - Lid
54:40 Lexithimie - Another Minute for a Never Ending
1:00:00 end

lost at sea

2010-06-13T21:47:00.002-05:00

What the heck? Two sea/water mixes in a row? I didn't plan it this way. It just sort of happened that I collected a few sea songs, then the library/soundtrack mix got done, then I found a few more sea songs and this mix happened.

"lost at sea" is very similar to "a solitary sea" from last year. Some nice drifting, flowing tunes with a definite sea/ocean feel to them. And of course all the tunes have the word "sea" in the title. The mix works really well on foggy mornings, standing out on the deck letting the music flow all around you.

There's not much else to say except that I hope you enjoy this latest collection.

Download (right click/save as) : 75mb, 54:30
lost at sea

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Milieu - the singing waters of an endless sea
07:30 Aless - inborn sea flowing
12:30 offthesky - sea ghosts
17:50 Jonsi & Alex - Daniell in the sea
25:40 Duncan 'O Ceallaigh - the sea and the sand
27:35 The Humble Bee - a century of sea stories
29:20 Sawako - april from sea shell
32:10 Arovane - seaside
35:30 Aglaia - the sea hides his secret selves
45:00 Seas - blue dub
53:15 Milieu - seashell breeze
54:30 end

beneath the surface

2010-06-05T13:11:00.007-05:00

Right off the bat, I have to come clean. I stole something. I stole the idea for this mix. But I'm glad I did because I'm very excited to post this new track.

Over at SoundCloud I ran into some mixes by Astromatt. He uses sounds from music libraries and soundtracks of '60's and '70's to create great underwater themed mixes. I love the sound of these old tracks & how they work together in a mix.

Who knew that these old library albums even existed?! After some research & digging, I decided to try my hand at a similar mix.

With a lot of this music, it's very easy to cross the line into cheesy/kitchy territory. I tried to find tunes that had that old 70's undersea soundtrack feel but were still listenable by today's ambient standards. I think it works pretty well as an ambient mix, very relaxing, with a cool watery vibe.

It was a lot of fun discovering some of these old albums & I'm sure I'll visit them again.

Download (right click/save as) : 53mb, 36:53
beneath the surface

T R A C K L I S T :

00:13 Amedeo Tommasi - Acque Tranquille
02:20 Eugene Thomass - Magic World of the Sea
04:50 Michel Redolfi - Music for Fresh Water
08:40 Franco Tamponi - Submarino
10:35 Gaston Borreani - Cirrus
13:40 Gaston Borreani - Entrelacs
17:16 Franco Tamponi - Stelle Marina
20:05 Amedeo Tommasi - Correnti Sottomarine
21:45 Piero Umiliani - Eliogabalus
24:00 Gaston Borreani - Rave Abyssal
26:10 Patchwork Orchestra - Brumes sur Mars
28:00 Franco Tamponi - Profundita
30:05 Fabor - Angelo di Mare
33:25 Gaston Borreani - Port Cross
36:53 end

Concerto for this & that

2010-05-30T21:15:00.003-05:00

Modern-classical, neo-classical, acousmatic, electro-acoustic, ...whatever you want to call the genre, I think this mix fits.

You'll hear lots of strings, some piano, some beats and more strings. It has a vague sort of chamber music feel to it. The mix takes a detour about halfway through with the Pjusk track. It's a good tune but doesn't necessarily fit the modern classical theme of the mix. But I think it flows well with the other tracks around it.

A lot of music I have been listening to sort of falls into this neo-classical/acoustic category so this was just a chance to get some of it out there in a mix.

Enjoy.

Download (right click/save as) : 80mb, 58:06
Concerto for this & that

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Panoptique Electrical - Framed by Clouds
07:23 Bersarin Quartet - Was uns Bleibt
10:45 Murcof - Rios
18:40 Olan Mill - Flume
21:00 Talvihorros - Thoughts of Violence
24:45 M. Ostermeier - Competing Memories, Both Correct
30:00 Part Timer - Orchard (scrumped)
31:00 Pjusk - Sus
35:25 M. Ostermeier - September Again
39:20 Danny Norbury - Speak, Memory
44:00 Panoptique Electrical - The Free Form
50:40 Loscil - Endless Falls
58:06 end

always returning

2010-05-22T21:17:00.002-05:00

I've been listening to a lot of older music lately. Been on a big progressive rock kick, King Crimson, Steve Hackett, Willowglass, Pink floyd, Phil Manzanera, Strawbs, etc. This lead me to dig up some older ambient tunes, which lead to this mix.

Listening to Michael Brook's "Hybrid" from 1985 brought back memories of how wonderful that album is. So I grabbed other ambient recordings from around the same time period and the result is the new mix, "always returning". I stole the title from the Eno tune which finishes the mix. It's appropriate because this is music that I will return to often.

Most of the recordings are from the 1980's, with two fo them from '77 & '78. There's a fair amount of Eno in here, whether it's his own tracks or his production. I guess that appropriate because in the '80's, Eno was an ambient god.

I hope you enjoy this quick bit of time traveling.

Download (right click/save as) : 73mb, 53:19
always returning

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Michael Brook - Distant Village 1985
04:00 Jon Hassell - darbari extension 1 1983
08:15 Penguin Cafe Orchestra - numbers 1 - 4 1981
13:40 Bill Nelson - Ringing True 1989
15:00 Harold Budd - Bismillahi Rrahmani Rrahim 1978
22:40 Laraaji - Essence 1988
28:20 David Sylvian - The Wooden Cross 1986
31:45 Cluster & Eno - Fur Luise 1977
36:30 Bill Nelson - Almost Unchanging 1989
38:00 Peter Gabriel - Slow Water 1985
40:00 Brian Eno - Unfamilar Wind (leeks hills) 1982
44:30 Michael Brook - Ocean Motion 1985
49:30 Brian Eno - Always Returing 1983
53:19 end

thru the field

2010-05-15T08:49:00.007-05:00

I recently was given a box of old sound effects records like the one in the picture. These albums brought back a lot of memories. As a kid I would go to the public library down the street and borrow their sound effects records. I guess that was an early sign that I'd end up with music tastes that were a bit different.

This new mix is perfect for my new vinyl sound effects collection, unfortunately I finished the mix before I got the records. So I'll have to save them for the next installment in the field mixes.

For this mix, the 3rd in the field music mixes, I tried to use more natural sound and less music. There are definitely musical elements here, thanks to Spheruleus, Nigel Samways and others. I tried to pick field sounds that weren't too obtrusive. There are many sounds that are interesting to listen to, but don't work as ambient "music". After a nice quiet section of wind blowing through bamboo, hearing fireworks exploding wouldn't work for me.

I'd like to bring attention to to releases used in this mix. They both come from a new netlabel, Audio Gourmet. "Rust" by Spheruleus & "Momentary" by Darren Harper are the first two releases. They are excellent recordings & they are free so check them out. Each one has a cut in the new field mix.

The tracklist is a bit vague, as the times are even more nebulous than normal. I hope you enjoy this latest field mix.

Download (right click/save as) : 82mb, 60min
thru the field

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Chihei Hatakeyama - Distant Sound of a Bustle
04:00 Loren Nerell - Wind Through Bamboo Forest
06:00 The Black Dog - M1
08:30 Jason Kahn - Transit
10:00 Framework podcast 11-5-09 excerpt
13:30 Seattle Phonographers Union - Hollow Earth Radio(excerpt)
15:30 Nigel Samways - City of Gas Street Lamps
19:00 Spheruleus - it sits on a shelf inside my skull
25:00 Mister Vapor - Rain 1
31:00 Chihei Hatakeyama - Dance of the Sea
33:00 Chris Watson - Vatnajokull
35:00 Quiet American - Khulna Station
37:00 Thomas Koner - 45_26n, 12_20e (hour three)
40:00 Steve Bradley - SO2 Emissions
41:30 Cecile Le Prado - Passages
43:30 Spheruleus - Rusting
47:30 Richard Chartier - Fields for Recording (excerpt)
52:00 Chris Watson - Bucaneve
53:00 Spheruleus - A Hindered View
55:30 Darren Harper - Field & Glass
60:00 end

driftage

2010-04-24T12:46:00.004-05:00

Drifting...floating...coasting...gliding...swimming...

Whatever word you choose, all would describe this mix perfectly. It's just a nice collection of mostly new tunes, all with a drifting, floating feel.

This mix works great for sleeping, enjoy.

D o w n l o a d (right click/save as) : 79mb, 57:00
driftage

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Moustache Mountain - poisonoussnake
05:50 Ben Fleury Steiner - Purple as the Dawn
09:45 Pausal - Midshipman
12:40 Back to Comm - Hotel Freund
16:00 Aglaia - A Boat Hunted the Edge of the Sea
22:40 Dirk Serries - microphonics v
28:35 Windy & Carl - I Have Been Waiting to Hear from You
34:40 Fabio Orsi - part 2 from Winterreise
40:15 Hildur Gudnadottir - Iridescence
49:15 m. ostermeier - Lost Weekend
53:00 Spheruleus - Orchid
57:00 end

eppur si muove(and yet it moves)

2010-04-16T23:02:00.006-05:00

The mixes are coming fast and furious! I'm trying to crank out a few more than normal. This one seems to be fast paced compared to the usual mixes found here.

This creation is similar to a mix I did in 2008 called "Motion for Relief". Ambient dub would be the best way to describe this installment. Not all the tunes are "dub" but most have beats, some more prominent than others. The feel is still pretty laid back, with just enough going on to give a sense of movement. Hence the title, "eppur si muove(and yet it moves)", which is apparently a phrase uttered by Galileo.

Enjoy

Download (right click/save as) : 82mb 59:57
eppur si muove(and yet it moves)

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Pan American - B esso
04:30 Deepchord - Vantage Isle (echospace reshape)
08:50 Aardvarck - bloom 4

11:45 Marconi Union - Shibuya
14:45 Porter Ricks - Redundance 3
20:40 Rhythm & Sound - Hit You Version ??
27:40 Kiln - Royal Peppermint Forest
30:50 Rena Jones - Indra’s Web
33:40 Rod Modell - beach
37:20 Shuttle 358 - Calty
40:50 Marconi Union - We Travel
47:25 Jonathan Hughes - Dieresis
49:40 Basic Channel - Radiance i edit
53:30 James Murray - eleven (decades mix)
59:57 end

flicker & fade

2010-04-13T07:24:00.005-05:00

This is the third mix I’ve done with a shortwave radio theme. Many of the tunes have noise & static already built in. Sometimes radio washes have been added.

As with past shortwave mixes, the actual shortwave recordings come courtesy of Myke Dodge Weiskopf. He runs a great site dedicated to shortwave music.

This mix was originally posted on MixCloud by folks at Fluid Radio. I am honored that Fluid Radio posted one of my mixes among their growing list of great music. I'm posting here to allow direct download. That's one feature I wish MixCloud had, the option of downloading the mixes. It's a great community over at MixCloud that would be even better with downloads.

I hope you enjoy vol. 3 in the shortwave series.

Download (right click/save as) : 99.8mb, 54:30
flicker & fade

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Myke Weiskopf - Test Transmission
00:40 Tim Hecker - Arctic Loner's Rock
03:50 All India Radio
05:20 Andrey Dergatchev - Culmination
07:45 Karlheinz Stockhausen - realization 6 (from spiral)
08:50 Tu M' - monochrome 3
14:20 Library Tapes - The Fragile Tide
16:30 Radio Slovakia Int'l
17:20 36 - Juliet
19:20 Maps & Diagrams - Mold
23:45 Marihiko Hara - modena
26:05 WNOH - Runyon's Gospel Descent
27:40 Ous Mal - Viime Talvi
29:40 Myke Weiskopf - Into the Telemetry Haze
30:50 Brian Grainger - untitled
34:10 Helios - Vargtimme
37:30 random noise fx
38:20 36 - intercept
39:00 BNR Radio Bulgaria
40:30 Drowning the Virgin Silence - We Twist the Sun & Sea
44:20 Krzysztof Orluk - over the sky (bright sphere)
46:30 Motion - dispersal patterns
48:00 atom - wellen and felder II
49:10 Xela - An Abandoned Robot
51:45 Eluvium - As I Drift Off
54:30 end

cloud mapping

2010-04-02T16:04:00.005-05:00

I have no idea why I called this mix "cloud mapping". It started off as something about the sky, then aerial views of something, then blah blah blah...then it ends up as "cloud mapping".

Most of the music is new or new-ish. There is no big time theme in this mix, just good, drifting ambient music. I guess you could picture yourself flying over clouds while listening to this. My favorite track in the mix is from Christopher Willits' release "Live on Earth Vol.1". It's the track, "Stars and Plants (live) – Kyoto, Japan – June 19, 2008".

Enjoy some good ol' floaty ambient.

Download (right click/save as) : 114mb 59:23
cloud mapping

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 in the field - rising
03:30 Christopher Willits - Stars and Plants (live) – Kyoto, Japan – June 19, 2008
12:45 Maps & Diagrams - Shuffle
17:50 Relmic Statute - a test for tapes & memories
22:10 Jannick Schou - Night
26:50 Ithaca Trio - Dragon Sleeps Well
30:55 Markus Guenter - Doppelgaenger
38:05 Terje Isungset - a glimpse of light
40:00 Cluster - lerandis
41:30 Akira Kosemura - 9 Guitar
42:20 Chihei Hatakeyama - light drizzle
46:30 Kyle Bobby Dunn - Empty Gazing
52:10 Christopher Willits - Golden Yarrow
55:00 Simon James French - Misery
59:23 end

a canticle unfolds

2010-03-24T07:36:00.004-05:00

I love all the mixes being posted on Mixcloud by Fluid Radio. They have a ton of neo-classical, Ambient, Modern Classical, Experimental Acoustic mixes on their Mixcloud page. So I set out to make my own "neo-classical" mix. And as I have said here before, sometimes mixes take you in directions that you weren't anticipating.

With "a canticle unfolds", I discovered some vocal music as I was searching for tracks with a modern classical feel. Some of the tunes appear as recorded, others have been altered or remixed a bit. In the end, I ended up with 10 vocal cuts.

This mix started out fairly straight forward, turned into an experiment and ended up as a nice listening experience. I hope you like it.

Download(right click/save as) : 110mb, 60:12
a canticle unfolds

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 The Hilliard Ensemble & Ivan Moody - Canticum Canticorum Remixed
03:40 Misound - sonno
05:30 Satie - Gnossienne Remixed
08:00 Nest - Marefjellet
12:00 Ambrose Field - La Dolce Vita
14:30 Gavin Byars Remixed
17:30 Morton Feldman - Rothko Chapel 5
21:00 Akira Rabelais - 1382_wyclif_gen._ii._7
24:30 Panoptique Electrical - the free form
29:40 Chorovaya Akademia - Nine Sili Nebesniye 1
32:40 Gavin Byars - Epilogue from Wonder Lawn
39:10 Bach Remixed
39:35 Roedelius - Lustwandel
43:15 Andrei Machado - ecce homo
47:30 Arvo Part - O Adonai
49:50 Annelies Monsere - 7
52:20 Debussy - des pas sur la neise
57:00 John Tavener - Mother & Child
60:12 end

the landscape listens

2010-02-16T11:53:00.008-06:00

It's the dead of winter, just trying to outlast the snow & cold, trying to make it to spring break.

The music in this mix has a sort of lonely winter feel to it. The tracks are not too dark or depressing, they just seem to conger up images of vast, snowy landscapes.

There are a few recordings in this mix from some of my recent favorite record labels. I'll just list some of those favorites...

Low Point
Experimedia
Hibernate
Under the Spire
Home Normal
Phantom Channel
Dead Pilot Records
Own Records

Low Point, Phantom Channel, Home Normal, Infraction, Serein, 12k and Under the Spire all made it into the mix. Although no Hibernate recordings made it, I've really been enjoying all the output from them lately. Check out the releases from all these great labels.

Next month I've got a mix coming out on Fluid Radio on MixCloud. I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this newest mix.

Download (right click/save as) : 60min, 115mb
the landscape listens

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Savvas Ysatis & Taylor Deupree - Hourglass
06:20 Kyle Bobby Dunn - Butel
11:15 Nest - Far From Land
15:30 Shaula - O
20:20 Shaula - Under a Palpebra
24:20 Ian Hawgood - Before I let the sunshine rot
30:45 Chihei Hatakeyama - Illusion of Memory 2
32:50 Kyle Bobby Dunn - There is no end to your beauty
42:10 Parks - Franja
47:50 Chihei Hatakeyama - The moon reflecting on the surface of the ocean
49:50 Marconi Union - Nothing ever happens in Tunguska
54:45 Coldstream - Alarums
1:00:00 end

slo mo

2010-01-17T13:03:00.003-06:00

Here's the first mix for 2010. It's called slo_mo because all the tunes are slow & droney.

One aspect of this mix that makes it a bit different is the use of a few "stretched" tracks. I think I've mentioned this program here before, it's called "Paul's Extreme Sound Stretch". I couldn't find a link to it, but at one time, on the web, there was a version of Beethoven's 9th Symphony that had been stretched to 24 hours.

I stretched 3 songs for the mix, Eno - Music for Airports, Laetetur Cor (Choir of the Abbey of Saint Wandrille) and Budd & Eno - A Stream With Bright Fish. Those tracks along with the others combine for a very slow mix that works pretty well for sleeping(I couldn't make past the 20min mark twice last night).

Enjoy.

Download (right click/save as) : 58mb 63:28
slo_mo

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 Eno - Music for Airports (s t r e t c h e d)
08:25 lexithimie - scale 1
12:35 Apalusa - Coventry, January 21, 2008
18:00 Laetetur Cor - Choir of the Abbey of Saint Wandrille (s t r e t c h e d)
22:20 Budd & Eno - A Stream with Bright Fish (s t r e t c h e d)
30:35 Celer - Gaited Florets
38:00 Porzellan - Rosen
47:10 Spheruleus - Time Fades
54:12 Language of Landscape - And The Rain Embraced Our Closing Words

Underwater - Lost in the Sub Aquatic Cosmos by Astromatt

2010-01-02T15:20:00.002-06:00

I found this great mix over at SoundCloud. It's a mix from Music Library and Soundtracks of '60's & '70's. It has a cool vibe that never devolves into retro kitsch. I'm definitely going to try and track down some of this music to use in future mixes. Astromatt also has another similar mix called "Submerged - Into the Deep Blue Sea", which is excellent as well.

Between these mixes & seeing the movie "Nine", I'm on a quest to dig up old Italian & French soundtracks.

Underwater - Lost in the Sub Aquatic Cosmos by Astromatt

Remember Tomorrow

2009-12-20T09:12:00.007-06:00

I was listening to music from Lunar Testing Lab the other day. The album, "Space Program", has a sort of retro/space/electronic feel to it. Boards of Canada in space?

I thought a whole mix of music with this kind of feel would be fun, so the result is "Remember Tomorrow". I tried to use tunes that had that retro, space program vibe without being too kitschy or cheesy. It's fine line & I hope I walked it successfully.

Lunar Testing Labs of course makes several appearances in the mix and of course Board of Canada had to be included. I am especially happy about being able to squeeze in the track "Cowboy" from The Units. I remember listening to it in college and absolutely loving the tune, so it was was fun to get it into a mix. I am also happy to have two Bowie cuts in there, "V-2 Schneider" & "Weeping Wall".

I found some sound from a recording called "Bob & Betty go to the Moon" and I used a couple clips from that old, corny recording. I tried not to use too much as it can easily distract from the music. I ended up using 4 samples, the coundown open & three other quickies. Using sound samples can be very tempting, tt's fun to use some but they can quickly get in the way of the music.

Although this mix is more beat-oriented than the typical Low Light offering, I think it's a fun trip.

Download(right click/save as) : 93mb, 51:00 min
Remember Tomorrow

T R A C K L I S T I N G :

00:00 Countdown from "Lunar Adventure in 1985"
00:13 Belbury Poly - Adventures in a Miniature Landscape
02:00 The Units - Cowboy
06:05 Harmonic 33 - Departure Lounge
10:30 Lunar Testing Lab - Lunar Radio control
11:30 EU - New Osc's
13:00 Boards of Canada - Wildlife Analysis
13:50 Freescha - The Sun is Still
16:00 Lunar Testing Lab - Orbiting Lunar Observatory
16:40 TRS-80 - moon Patrol
22:30 David Bowie - V2 Schneider
25:10 Bochum Welt - interlude
28:25 Lunar Testing Lab - Phantom Cosmonaut
30:50 Signaldrift - Children of the 70's
32:20 Harmonic 33 - Planet 54
35:50 Frank Comstock - Music from Outer Space(when you wish upon a star)
37:50 Boards of Canada - Nova Scotia Robots
38:50 Bernard Szajner - A Kind of Freedom
41:30 Talvihorros - A Rural Place
43:35 David Bowie - Weeping Wall
46:35 Boards of Canada - Dayvan Cowboy
51:05 end

a solitary sea

2009-12-15T11:30:00.007-06:00

I haven't had time to do anything new lately but today I'm home sick so I had some time in between naps.

I was listening to "Nautica" by krill.minima, and it got me in the mood for some "sea" music.

A few things came to mind immediately, such as Eluder, Loscil & a new track by Intrusion. From there I just searched for tunes with 'sea', 'water', 'ocean' or other watery words in the titles. I think the tunes work pretty well together. The first 20 minutes has a great ebb & flow, breathing-like quality which I love.

Enjoy.

Download(right click/save) : 110mb, 60:00 min.
a solitary sea

T R A C K L I S T :

00:00 krill.minima - Submarine Poetry
07:00 Intrusion - Under the Ocean
10:00 Eluder - The Most Beautiful Blue
14:30 Rod Modell - Cold Watery Depths
21:30 Jim Cole - Ocean Depths
25:00 Adam Pacione - Buoy
31:10 Loscil - Pressure
35:00 Thomas Koner - 31.46.n.35.13e(hour ten)
36:20 Milieu - Christening Ships at port
43:20 krill.minima - Surface from the Groundless Oceans
50:30 Shaula - Sea of Trees
53:30 Jeff Greinke - Over Water
1:00:00 end

landing dust

2009-11-03T07:57:00.001-06:00

The year was 1982. I was a student at UW-Madison and very much into ambient music. Eno had released the 4 ambient albums along with others like Music for Films, Discreet Music, Evening Star, No Pussyfooting and I had them all.

I don’t play any instruments but I enjoy playing with anything musical. My roommate had a Teac reel-to-reel tape machine that I loved to play with. Through Fripp & Eno I had learned to feed the output of the play head back though to the rec input to create a nice loop/echo effect. I’d sit & play with it for hours. I made recordings as I strung rubber bands on the legs of the coffee table, poured water into metal bowls, beat coffee cans with pencils, created feedback by dropping the mic into various containers and so on.

One of my favorite things to record was my cheap little Casio keyboard, the kind with only four voices…piano, flute, violin and organ. Eventually I figured out how to get the system to create nice drones & feedback loops. This track is the result of that experimentation. There is little or no musicianship involved. It was improvised live to tape using the Casio keyboard & the Teac reel-to-reel.

At least I think it was live, there might have been some drone recorded in the first pass then played back on some crappy cassette deck while more loopy feedback was played along with it. Either way, I was just making it up & twiddling knobs as I went along.

It brings back a lot of memories of messing around with any sort of audio gear I could get my hands on as I was growing up. Walking through the neighborhood with a recorder & headphones on, sitting in my parents basement til 2am trying to get some Jean Michel Jarre sounds out of an old synth, laying in bed at night trying to tune in a barely-working shortwave radio, wiring old car speakers to the furniture in my bedroom when I was 14.

I actually like this track, “Landing Dust”, that came from that reel-to-reel experimentation. It’s definitely the only thing close to musical or ambient I’ve ever recorded. I have no idea if anyone else will find this listenable. But I wanted to throw it out there anyway.

Download : 49mb, 20:26

Landing Dust

Reflections

2009-10-31T19:35:00.002-05:00

My output hasn’t been great the last couple of months but thanks to some talented guest mixers Low Light Mixes has new material to post. This is the third guest mix in the last 4 or 5 months and they are all greatly appreciated.

For this mix Muttley presents – Back to Mine Pt. 2 – Reflections. This is our second mix from Mick, who did “Drones in Duality” back in June. He describes "Reflections" as “music for healing bereavements, remedying mental disorders brought to light, enacting occupational therapy, and cherishing the good memories that can sometimes be hard to reach.”

Mick has other fine mixes floating around the intertubes. You can find some at Subversion and his Ambient Lovers thread(congrats on 300 posts!). Soon he will have mixes available at Hydrogen Cafe and Presto Samo. Mick also collaborated with Rick at Hydrogen Cafe on a great mix called “Transference”. Check out all of the Muttley mixes, wherever you may find them.

Download : 169mb, 74:00min.

Reflections

T R A C K L I S T :

01. Brian Mcbride - The Guilt Of Uncomplicated Thoughts (from the album "When The Detail Lost Its Freedom" - Kranky)
02. Philip Jeck - Wholesome (from the album "7" - Touch)
03. Rameses III - The Kindness Of Letting Go (from the album "I Could Not Love You More" - Type)
04. Mogwai - Aidan's Waltz (from the album "Come On Die Young" - Chemikal Underground)
05. Hilmar O Hilmarrson & Sigur Ros - Degradation (from the album "Angels Of The Universe" - Import)
06. Olafur Arnalds - Lost Song (from the album "Found Songs" - Erased Tapes)
07. ASC - Highbrow (from the Warm008 12' - Warm Communications)
08. Autechre - Nil (from the album "Amber" - Warp)
09. The Drift - Noumena (from the album "Ceiling Sky" - Temporary Residence)
10. The Alpha Rhythm - The Return (from the album "Proof Of Concept" - Seedknowledge)
11. The Cinematic Orchestra - Diabolus (from the album "Motion" - Ninja Tune)
12. Badmammal - Sending And Taking (goodluck/badluck unreleased)
13. Glint - Double Vision (from the album "Sound In Silence" - www.glintonline.com)
14. A Silver Mount Zion - The Triumph Of Our Tired Eyes (from the album "Born Into Trouble As The Sparks Fly Upward" - Constellation)