1993, A Great Year in Ambient Music: Poll and Discussion (with a corrected album list)

Voted Blood Music. I prefer it to 76:14 actually.

Loads of awesome stuff on this list too, but for me it ultimately boils down to Shades of Orion versus Nephology. Shades of Orion is so cosmic and beautiful and illuminated, but Nephology is so murky and weird and moody! Apollo vs Dionysos, indeed... I can't decide!

Ah, and I noticed that there's a typo in the list... "Strange Cargo II" should read "Strange Cargo III". I'm not gonna start a new thread just to correct the typo, but I hope everyone knows it's III that came out in 1993. II is from 1990, I think.

You missed Hoedh - Hymnvs, it's probably my favourite ambient record of all time and incidentally, also the number one rated on RYM.

excellent selection... pentamerous metamorphosis is what leaps out at me after a first pass, but I need to think about it!

Voted Psychick Warriors ov Gaia in the other poll before it was pointed out it was intelligible. Tempted to go for Chapterhouse but since I voted Global Communication in the 94 poll will reconsider and listen to some of the others again.

The Orb Live album is probably the highlight of their career.

Air - air, just ahead of Pentamerous Morphosis.

Do people still rate Strange Cargo III? I listened to it a couple of years ago, and was positively surprised, it didn't really sound corny/dated like I thought it would (not even the track with rapping), it has a nice synthesis of the older ambient/new age sound and the newer techno/house influences. That said, the fourth Strange Cargo album (released as Strange Cargo, not as William Orbit) was exactly the sort of cliched chill-out wallpaper music that III managed to avoid being.

Orbit had such a weird career, from synth popper to house remixer in the 80s, and then in the early 90s he was doing both commercial Eurodance as Bassomatic (which was actually pretty good), while also producing this kind of hippy ambient. And that's not even counting his later move into pop producing.

dont think i have ever got through the first scanner album in one sitting.

tis a little too empty.

listening in on peoples convo's just becomes a tad tiresome.

re orbit : aside the brilliant bassomatic material, for me it was about the torch song album, toward the unknown region.

it has all the bubbly synths of the day, but a massive ambient dreampop vibe to it.

going to listen to SC 1-3 again as i have not heard them in years.

_sophie&franz_

My ambient top 30 for 1993:
Hoedh - Hymnvs
Shinjuku Thief - The Witch Hammer
Namlook/Morris - Dreamfish
Thomas Köner - Permafrost
Inanna - Storm I-III
The Orb - Live 93
Deutsch Nepal - Benevolence (Flogging Satan Alive)
Namlook/Biosphere - The Fires Of Ork
Sun Electric - Kitchen
Nijiumu - Era Of Sad Wings
Suspended Memories - Forgotten Gods
Rapoon - Raising Earthly Spirits
Jam & Spoon - Tripomatic Fairytales 2002
Main - Dry Stone Feed
Naked City - Absinthe
Lull - Journey Through Underworlds
Steve Roach - Origins
Labradford - Prazision LP
Baked Beans - Baked Beans
The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath A Cloud - S/T
Namlook - Air
Muslimgauze - Vote Hezbollah
Inanna - Day Ov Torment
Empirical Sleeping Consort - I've Got Tears in My Ears From Lying on My Back Catatoning Over You, Dear
In The Nursery - An Ambush Of Ghosts
Archon Satani - Mind Of Flesh And Bones
Zoviet France ‎- What Is Not True
Namlook/Inoue - Shades Of Orion
Seclusion - Yukigafuru
The Fireman - Strawberries Oceans Ships Forest

So for this poll, Dreamfish it is. So many good records in this year.

not got that many off these lists.
i was still an indie kid.
however, i did get dreamfish (rising high edition not fax - i once saw the fax edition and did not buy it .. doh !), and still listen to it a lot, so that's probably going to get my vote.
whatever happened to mixmaster morris ?
he was on the shamens synergy tour and was really good, but after an album for ninja tune, and dreamfish 2, that appears to have been it for his own thing.
seems like a lovely guy as well.
i recall he used to interact on the old FAX email/group list thing back in the day before google took over the internet.

Love that Labradford album

Yeah, I wonder what happened to Mixmaster Morris too, it doesn't look like he's released anything since the 90s, except for a couple of DJ mixes.

His album for Ninja Tune, It's Tomorrow Already, is really good by the way, it's one of the best examples of the chill-out/downtempo stuff that evolved from the ambient house/techno of the early 90s. He uses samples brilliantly, and never crosses the line into the sort of coffee bar wallpaper music that a lot of other artists in that genre were doing. (Here's looking at you, Nightmares on Wax!)

Something not in the poll that could be worth revisiting is Uzect Plaush (Paul Schutze) - More Beautiful Life album on Apollo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UqQtohVy-Q

--

Mixmaster Morris update - looks like he has a single due out soon. It's called Higher State Of Mind, so no great thematic departures there, then.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDsKGlbS9fY

Also a couple of recentish remixes here:

http://thebeaufortscale.bandcamp.com/track/raytripper-the-irresistible-force-trip
http://interchill.bandcamp.com/track/genetics-irresistible-force-no-gmo-remix

Another one - Bob Holroyd - Fluidity & Structure

Not my favourite track on there but there isn't much of it on youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZN4WdFfWOo

Holger Czukay's Moving Pictures is also pretty much an ambient record.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T1k2lS0gIs

Uzect Plaush is excellent indeed!

It is. I listened to it all when I posted last night and it really holds up.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

A lot less voters in this poll than previous one, I guess 76:14 and SAWII really are the only two ambient albums from this era most people know. Lol at the 2 votes for "Cross of Changes" too; it's not a bad album, but do your really think it's the best of this bunch?!

I think I'll do a 1992 poll next, so maybe you could mention some your favourite ambient albums from that year in this thread, so I won't accidentally omit some essential stuff again.

PWOG

Yeah, that one I certainly would've remembered to include, might be my #1 pick for that year.

Just missed this poll. Think I would have voted Dreamfish if only for 'School of fish' which would be a desert island pick for me. Love it when the sub bass makes an appearance towards the end.

Dreamfish for me too I think. 'Hymn' does go on a bit but then it is FAX. I wanted to listen to Nephology again before voting but didn't get round to it. Their EPs around that time were good.

Lots of 'big' ambient stuff from this year was also non-album such as Space Time Continuum - Flouresence EP, FSOL - Cascade EP, Irresistible Force remixes of Autumn Leaves, Barbarella, Geek Love, Global Communication remix of Reload - Biosphere.

Discogs list of Ambient releases from 1992.

http://www.discogs.com/search/?limit=250&style_exact=Ambient&decade=1990&year=1992

Yeah, I've used Discogs as help compiling these other two lists, but the problem is that it includes every record that has "ambient" marked as one of its genres, even if the main genre of the record is something else. For example, the Dance 2 Trance one listed on the first page has an ambient track or two, but it certainly isn't an ambient album as a whole.

I know. Useful as a memory jogger though. 1,800 releases is only a few pagefulls ;p

This is a decent list to look for inclusions.

I have to say though 1992 is a much, much less impressive year than 1993-1995.

Some from '92. Tuomas, I hope you see fit allow the inclusion of EPs etc. as there's some great stuff not on albums.

Trans-4M - Sublunar Oracles
Dr. Motte's Euphorythm - Chill Out Planet Earth
David Morley - Evolution
Atlantis - Paradise
Global Communication - The Keongaku EP
Sisterlove - The Hypnotist
Projekt Erde - 11:11

And these of course.

Irresistible Force - Flying High
Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia - Ov Biospheres & Sacred Grooves
Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85-92
Biosphere - Microgravity
Silence - Silence
Oldfield Versus The Orb - Sentinel (Total Overhaul)
Keiichi Suzuki - Satellite Serenade
Ambient Dub Volume 1 - The Big Chill
Sven Vath - Accident In Paradise
Main - Hydra-Calm

I'd also say Spectrum - Soul Kiss (Glide Divine) and Spritualized - Laser Guided Melodies but maybe that's getting too rock. Worth noting the overlap, though.

Then there's a bunch of Steve Roach, Hector Zazou, Jorge Reyes, Enya, Eno etc. that I don't know too well or cant remember.

Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 85-92

I've been kinda wondering whether this should be included, despite the title? I've never listened to the full album, but all the tracks I've heard from it sound like techno to me. Is the majority of the album still ambient?

Most of it has beats but I think the point is it works in an ambient way; it's not really music for dancing vigorously to and there is a ton of reverb and environmental ambience on most of it. It's no more banging than the PWOG record. I suppose they are both part of an idea of ambient that was around at the time.

Having said that it would likely get votes just because it's probably a lot more recognisable than anything else in the list. If you wanted to leave it off on a technicality I wouldn't mind.

Good interview with Mixmaster Morris here. Worth it for the working titles of a possible new Irresistible Force album. Also apparently he did make an album in 2001 but Ninja Tune didn't want to release it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Hlz3GE-UjQ

Should probably drop this here.

http://reynoldsretro.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/ambient-archaeology.html

enjoyed that !

ta for posting as i rarely check SR's blog.

i wonder whatever became of that kevin foakes bloke.

i wonder whatever became of that kevin foakes bloke.

― mark e, Thursday, July 9, 2015 9:19 AM (Yesterday)