My dad is often to be found listening to Sounds of the 60s. As far as I can tell, the programme is often filled with complete drivel.
But I can easily see the appeal. Even the biggest pile of crap can take on greater significance when viewed through those special rose-tinted nostalgia-spectacles. Anything that reminds us of our youth is a good thing.
But the strangest things can attach themselves to these youthful nostalgic feelings. Recently I was listening to the radio when ‘If it Makes You Happy’ by Sheryl Crow came on.
(Unfortunately, the video is still pretty bad — I guess her image hadn’t settled down yet — so I have removed the video bit from the YouTube embed code.)
It’s not a song I ever particularly enjoyed before. But for some reason, it brought me warm memories of the mid-1990s. All of a sudden I liked the vibe of the song — rather carefree-sounding. Somehow I visualised talking a car journey late on a sunny summer’s evening.
How can a song I never liked before suddenly create strong feelings? I guess this is the first hint of what is to come. As I become older, everything from my youth will start to seem better.
Continuing my look at 20 Warp albums from Warp’s 20 years. For other articles in this series, please see the table of contents to the right. Albums are presented in randomised order.
Broadcast — The Noise Made by People
This was the first Warp album I ever bought, and it remains a favourite of mine to this day. Broadcast’s music is heavily steeped in 1960s influence, and comparisons with Stereolab are commonplace (and not inaccurate). But they sound anything but derivative.
The Noise Made by People has a dark and slightly creepy aesthetic. Most of the album creeps along at a rather slow pace. Then there are Trish Keenan’s almost robotic vocals. The music itself — largely based on 1960s-style electronic instruments — could almost be transmitted directly from that decade, complete with unsettling background noise.
Put together, this all gives the music a rather otherworldly vibe. It is as though you are listening to a ghostly music that has been trapped in the airwaves since the 1960s and has only just escaped.
Funnily enough, the real life story of the recording of this album is similar to the picture I have just described. It is said that Broadcast struggled with the recording of the album, and it took three years to make. Perhaps this is another reason why it sounds clinical, though it’s all the more captivating for it.
Since The Noise Made by People, Broadcast have reduced in size to become just the core duo of Trish Keenan and James Cargill. In turn, the music has become less dense and more raw, and has lost the otherworldly qualities of their earlier material. Although Broadcast is still a good band, I feel that they were definitely at their peak with this album.
This video for ‘Come On Let’s Go’ captures the aesthetic of the album really well:
Tortoise — Standards
Many feel that Tortoise were at their strongest in the 1990s. I did not discover them until 2001, so maybe I am biased in that sense. But I think that the band was at the height of its creative powers with Standards.
Quite simply, it was one of the most unique-sounding albums I had ever heard and remains one of my favourite listens to this day. The effortless fusion of punchy rock, cutting-edge electronic music, multi-layered drumming and jazz makes this an extraordinarily bold album that captivates you from start to finish.
If ever there was an album that was definitively not just ‘going through the motions’, it is surely Standards — despite its title. This record documents Tortoise standing on the very edge of what is possible with rock music. I find it impossible to become bored of this album. There is so much going on in so many layers.
Each instrument would be fascinating to listen to on its own (this was proved when the rhythm section of Tortoise released an album of drums and little else called Bumps). Each band member is doing his own thing. And yet, everything here makes a perfect fit.
Nothing Tortoise have produced since then has come close to reaching the standard of Standards. But then again, few albums by any bad do.
This is the video for the attention-grabbing album opener, ‘Seneca’:
Seefeel – Succour
I only discovered this album a few years ago — probably over a decade after it was originally released. But I am glad I opted to buy it. The music is from the place where ambient, shoegaze, indie and techno all converge. The allure of Seefeel comes from its mixture of ambient-style drones and textures, techno-influenced minimalist drums and guitars, and the dreamy, processed vocals of singer Sarah Peacock.
Although superficially it feels like a pure techno / IDM album, the use of guitars and live drums was unusual for a Warp release at that time. This is what led Steve Beckett to recently single it out as “the first sacreligious move”.
Musically, Succour is a fabulous success. But if you thought this was the evidence that guitars could happily sit in a techno environment, think again. Apparently due to Mark Clifford’s efforts to push the band in a more electronic direction, the old artistic differences emerged and the band only lasted a few years after the release of Succour.
In a way, I feel as though I have missed out by not experiencing this music when it was first released. It must have been so incredibly exciting, at the cutting edge, when it was released. It would be interesting to hear what this band would come up with today.
Incredibly, Seefeel have recently re-formed. Initially this was for a one-off gig as part of the Warp20 celebrations. But there are now hints that Seefeel have also been in the studio. I can’t wait to hear any results that might come out of this.
Chris Morris — Blue Jam
Chris Morris, as one of Britain’s most influential satirists, probably needs little introduction. But few may immediately associate him with Warp Records. But Warp has been the outlet for a lot of his material, including the CD releases of the radio series On the Hour and his Bafta-winning short film My Wrongs #8245-8249 & 117 among other bits and pieces. Warp Films is also backing his current project, Four Lions.
But his first CD on Warp was a compilation of sketches from his experimental radio programme, Blue Jam (which was later turned into the television series Jam). This was a dark comedy, equal parts disturbing and funny. Unusually, the sketches were surrounded by a constant backdrop of ambient music (much of which was originally released on Warp) from the likes of Aphex Twin. Perhaps even more unusually, the show was originally broadcast on Radio 1. It inhabited a late-night slot which fitted with the programme’s surreal, woozy and nightmarish style.
The series contained a mixture of music and comedy; of the surreal and the disturbing; of sketches and monologues. Most of it was a world away from his previous material, though from time to time Morris would drop in one of his infamous interviews. Here, he flummoxes posthumous Diana biographer Andrew Morton.
This is more or less what you would expect from Stereolab. Fantastically jaunty and slightly idiosyncratic pop songs. This is hardly Stereolab’s best album (and I say that as someone who has only heard three of them), but it is a joy nonetheless.
9. David Byrne and Brian Eno — Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
This pair produced one of the most important and experimental albums of recent decades. But My Life in the Bush of Ghosts was over 25 years ago, and this was the first time they had worked together since. There was no point in expecting the same again, and what we have here is an album of fairly conventional — though diverse — pop songs. It seems as though Brian Eno’s mission in life just now is to make good songs (which have good lyrics). There are some great songs here (I particularly like ‘I Feel My Stuff’), but it ain’t a world changer.
8. Neon Neon — Stainless Style
Boom Bip and Gruff Rhys built on their earlier collaborations to create this most unlikely of concept albums. It is based on the life of John DeLorean, creator of the DeLorean car which was clad in stainless steel. The music revels in the 1980s concept, and the slightly off-the-wall idea behind the album belies a clear genuine love of indulgent 1980s synth-pop. A great listen.
7. Various artists — BBC Radiophonic Workshop: A Retrospective
A great look back at the legacy of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, the hugely influential electronic music department. This 2CD set compiles music from the entire 40 year life of the Workshop. The first CD is absolutely charming, and my jaw drops thinking about how much effort was put into these early electronic masterpieces. The later music is not so special — ironically as the technology got better it only opened up a world of identikit sounds. This is not enough to spoil the CD as a whole though.
I just adore this album, which faithfully recreates vintage electronic music of the sort we were all exposed to in our youth. Be transported to two or three decades back. Television idents, programmes for schools, public information films, library music… dare I say the Radiophonic Workshop? But all with more than a smidgen of creepiness and uneasiness built in. It’s Boards of Canada+. If that’s your sort of thing this really is an essential purchase. Don’t listen to it at night though.
5. John Baker — The John Baker Tapes Volume 1 and 2
John Baker was one of the most important members of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. This pair of CDs unearthed a load of hidden gems from his career that may otherwise have ended up in a skip. Volume 1 documents his work at the BBC, with lots of great bits and pieces like news jingles, theme tunes and little bits for educational programmes (I love the song about not being taken in by slick salesmen). Volume 2 focuses on his commercial work and private recordings of his jazz piano playing. There are notes on each of the tracks, an in-depth biography written by his brother, Richard Anthony Baker, and a recording of the Radio 5 Live obituary broadcast also by Richard Anthony Baker.
The CDs serve not only as an important document of John Baker’s work, or even a collection of important electronic music — but almost as a time capsule of 1960s and 1970s life in Britain. Tracks titles like ‘Decimal Currency’, ‘Building the Bomb’ and ‘Giro Advert’ serve to make the collection an important document of social history too.
Tom Jenkinson expanded on the more live sound he has developed since Ultravisitor by producing this concept album inspired by a fantasy futuristic band from his daydreams. It’s a good device that allows him to become quite indulgent with his use of experimental electronic techniques, while also exhibiting his über bass and drumming skills. At the same time there are gloriously poppy songs like the irresistible ‘A Real Woman’.
The Fiery Furnaces don’t know how to do anything the conventional way, and they even found a way to completely change the way you can think of a live album. The recordings are pieced together from a variety of different concerts. And it’s not just different songs from different recordings. Different recordings of the same song are spliced together, mercilessly interrupting itself in the middle, complete with jarring changes in sound quality. It is not as annoying as you might think. Along with the fact that the live versions of songs are often radically different to the original studio recording, this is sure not to be a wasted purchase.
2. Autechre — Quaristice and Quaristice (Versions)
Autechre seldom fail to surprise. The often imitated but never bettered duo specialise in altering your perception of what music can be. With Quaristice they pushed on with their particular brand of pathbreaking electronic music. But it lacks the coherence of previous albums, jumping about in style and mood from track to track while previous albums had a well defined sound of their own. Instead of the eight or nine long tracks, Quaristice has 20 tracks more typically three or four minutes long. I originally felt that it was a weak album, but now whenever I listen to it I find myself completely loving it. Even a disappointing Autechre album is head and shoulders above what anyone else produces.
Quaristice (Versions), the extra CD that came with the limited edition version, is shaped more like a traditional Autechre album, but the music itself is more of the same — literally. Longer cuts give these tracks more room to breathe, making it a perfectly pleasurable listen, even if it did begin to feel like you were paying for the same music several times over (especially if you bought Quaristice.Quadrange.ep.ae, which I reviewed in the earlier post).
Hands up who expected this album to be crap? An 11 year gestation period did not bode well. But the end result is in fact excellent. Actually, I could hardly believe what a good job Portishead had done. Clearly having made a conscious decision to avoid the Portishead trademarks which turned into trip hop clichés, the band have set themselves a subtly new direction and have pulled it off magnificently. There is still that slightly dark and black-and-white sound. But now there is a rather more live feel to the music, albeit with more of an emphasis on jaggy and sometimes slightly unsettling electronic sounds. And the songs are absolutely top-notch. I hope it isn’t 11 years until the next Portishead album.
This was the first Warp album I ever bought, and it remains a favourite of mine to this day. Broadcast’s music is heavily steeped in 1960s influence, and comparisons with Stereolab are commonplace (and not inaccurate). But they sound anything but derivative.
Many feel that Tortoise were at their strongest in the 1990s. I did not discover them until 2001, so maybe I am biased in that sense. But I think that the band was at the height of its creative powers with Standards.
I only discovered this album a few years ago — probably over a decade after it was originally released. But I am glad I opted to buy it. The music is from the place where ambient, shoegaze, indie and techno all converge. The allure of Seefeel comes from its mixture of ambient-style drones and textures, techno-influenced minimalist drums and guitars, and the dreamy, processed vocals of singer Sarah Peacock.
Chris Morris, as one of Britain’s most influential satirists, probably needs little introduction. But few may immediately associate him with Warp Records. But Warp has been the outlet for a lot of his material, including the CD releases of the radio series On the Hour and his Bafta-winning short film My Wrongs #8245-8249 & 117 among other bits and pieces. Warp Films is also backing his current project, Four Lions.
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