TS: Aphex Twin: Selected ambient works 85-92 VS SAW Volume 2

I don't think everything that has beats sucks at all but he has never managed to make an out and out grebt record by using beats.

SAWII is the best thing i've heard from him.

While I think this is balderdash, I do hold the "piano" pieces on Druqks in very high regard, despite the general spottiness of that album. If I had a CD burner, I'd make myself a special EP of just those tracks. The very last track, in particular, is so beautiful it hurts.

The first track he was known for was Didgeridoo, which was pretty pounding. But the next was Analogue Bubblebath, which was classically fluffy.

His beats are crap! They really are.

''No dude, SAW I was his first big release on Warp! I comes before II, you see...''

ok thought it was on that label from belgium, my memory fails me again at this late hour.

Possibly because the track is called the "Original Mix"?

SAW 85-92 and SAWII are both gorgeous and brilliant. I couldn't possibly choose.

Oh, okay, whoops.

It would be quite something if all the tracks on that album really had started out like that, and then had the beats removed on a whim.

Just read this and I agree with everything Clarke B said. I like the long silences in the middle - they get very interesting in the wee hours, especially if you're half awake because it's the silences that make you wake up!

Um, Ben Williams is very VERY wrong btw. SAW1 was on R&S, not Warp. Polygon Window was RDJ's first album on Warp. And the Twin's beats rule. Obviously people are forgetting "I Care Because You Do", probably the most consistent (and best) beat-driven Aphex album. The RDJ Album and Come To Daddy are great as well.

...and Green Calx is better than all three of them.

I don't have SAWII, so I'm going to hold off on rating it until I get a copy.

don't you just hate posting something you already said months ago on the same thread?

Me too Gaz. What a disappointment.

er, piano is a percussion instrument?

Okay, does anyone here actually find nothing at all remotely disturbing about these tracks? Yes the record is in some sense quite beautiful, but god how some of those sound worlds get under my skin! Maybe it's good I've never done acid...

Yes. I listened to SAWII while shrooming one time. Everyone went to some godawful bar to celebrate someone's birthday so I was all alone. I eventually had to turn it off because it was 'giving me bad vibes, maaan.'
I do wish there were more hauntingly beautiful tracks on there, such as the one Clarke just mentioned (Disc 1, Track 3--which to me isn't lonesome, but instead evokes the feeling of lying in bed in the arms of a lover)(but it does have that 'all is right w/the world, too bad I'll eventually die' mood too)

Clarke B's story about his dad and Disc 1, Track 3, aka One Of the Most Beautiful Songs Ever = genius.

"Selected Ambient Works 85-92, 2x12" (R&S)
Selected Ambient Works 85-92, CD (Distance)
Selected Ambient Works 85-92, CD (Apollo)
Selected Ambient Works 85-92, CD (Apollo)"

i dont remember it ever being on warp either.
the warp site shows the 'on' ep to be the first aphex record out on warp, 15.11.93

Call me old-fashioned, but I like my beats to have at least a minimal sense of rhythm.

SAW1 makes me immensely happy and brings make too many good memories of being in London and my conversion from serious student to clubber; SAW2 is rewarding, but not immediate in the same way as SAW1.

I listened to both this week, and SAW1 wins.

Strangely that sentiment also neatly describes how I feel about Nirvana's Nevermind and In Utero.

I never found out when the songs were recorded but Xtal gives the impression of being quite old, doesn't it?

I'm going to play this now.

I know, I know ILM. Hold your breath.

Tha always makes me feel like I'm in my high school gym. Not cause I played it in there either...

Anyways, Killian Murphy was OTM in his initial remark that the first two tracks were the best thing on the album.

all his tracks have his signifiers though?

Yeah, I guess so..perhaps some just resonate with me more

he comes up with some gnarly bass lines, like those in 4 bit, papat4, and Xmas_Evet10 on Syro. hell, even the circlont14 (Shrymoming mix) 20-step bass breakdown is good for a calboti (an internal chuckle). the textures are surely popping, or maybe they're just remarkable. papat4 is elating, the bass is burgeoning.. but it's short-lived. oh, Aphex *sigh*

https://youtu.be/_1Pk2bKF3xs

this Aleksi Perälä character uses tonalities (Colundi Sequences?) that vaguely recall saw II.. giant catalog of his stuff on Bandcamp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB_ClJ9nikY

Thanks for sharing that am0n. Getting serious tingles.