graceful silence

"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

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

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

"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

"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

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

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

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

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

"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