"wide open desert music" S/D

Currently enjoying Dust to Dust very much. Great interview, too.

I want a recommendation engine for 'wide open desert' music - stuff like Dust to Dust, the Hired Hand soundtrack, any Scott Tuma, Eyvind Kang's Live Low to the Ground...

― The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums (Chinaski), Saturday, March 18, 2017 12:39 PM

Those last three are the biggies, imo, assuming you probably already know the Paris, Texas soundtrack. Do you know a band called Padang Food Tigers? They definitely hit on this vibe quite a bit, despite being about as far from the desert landscape as you can get (UK, iirc). Also, there are a lot of people working this angle from a dronier / noisier angle, like pedal steel guitarist Chas Smith (not to be confused with drummer Ches Smith), William Fowler Collins, and probably a few others.

There are probably people who can direct you to the "right" Calexico records, too (there are instrumental albums that definitely touch on this style) but I'm not really well-versed enough to say

― Wimmels, Saturday, March 18, 2017 1:03 PM

Yes - love the Food Tigers! And, aye, definitely uk based. Paris, Texas is all-time. I'd forgotten Chas Smith. Santa Fe is a hell of a thing. Will check William Fowler Collins, for sure. Cheers.

― The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums (Chinaski), Saturday, March 18, 2017 1:10 PM

I want a recommendation engine for 'wide open desert' music

See also:

Susan Alcorn - And i await the Resurrection (maybe not her best, but its what I have)
Barn Owl - any
Ry Cooder - Paris, Texas of course, also look for Trespass, Last Man Standing OSTs
Dead Texan - eponymous debut
Bruce Kaphan - Slider: Ambient Excursions for Pedal Steel Guitar
Long Desert Cowboy - any
Rainer (Ptacek) - Nocturnes

― Sanpaku, Saturday, March 18, 2017 11:14 PM (five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

if Live Low To The Earth In The Iron Age is part of this genre, I'm starting a thread

― sleeve, Saturday, March 18, 2017 11:19 PM (0 seconds ago) Bookmark

that Eyvind Kang record is one of my favorite things ever.

does Scenic fit in here? it's been a long tiem since I heard those records.

thanks in advance thread

I forgot to mention the two Slim Westerns albums by A Small, Good, Thing (aka O Yuki Conjugate).

I think of Scenic as more western tinged instrumental rock. There's an omnipresent drum kit, which keeps it out of ambient territory.

Though they include a few songs, the two albums by Maggie Björklund (Coming Home (2010) and Shaken (2014)) may belong here, too.

most calexico, i think?
friends of dean martinez

thx for the A Small, Good, Thing recommendations, I am a big OYC fan and have always meant to check them out.

I feel like some specific Dirty Three tracks might fit in here as well, or Tren Brothers?

Funny somebody mentioning Scenic which I think was intentionally influenced by the local Arizona scenery.
I always get images of the long range desert group driving landrovers across the sahara when listening to tracks from Jamahiriya by Licher's earlier Savage Republic. Which was my immediate response to the title question.

The most recent Daniel Lanois album, Goodbye to Language - a whole album of droney pedal steel. My favorite album of 2016.

surprised no one's mentioned earth this side of hex; or printing in the infernal method. or are they outside the boundaries?

William Tyler?

earth - hex was my second thought

my first thought was the track 'despite the roar' by bardo pond

black sun ensemble - the self-titled one on reckless with a goldfish flying thru space on the cover

Yeah was going to mention Mr Acedo and folks. 1st lp got a cd reissue a few years ago but not sure fi it's still around.
I came in via Lambent Flame and wasn't sure what track was very deserty but since Acedo came from the desert region I think it is heavily reflected in the music.

gosh lambent flame, that record was not kind to my ears. 2nd s/t is just lovely the whole way through

Neil Young's Dead Man soundtrack.

This is magnificent. A day imagining the loneliness, the wind a fibrous wall... I keep thinking of a line from the Monkey Wrench Gang: 'the desert eased his vague anger'.

I know vocals and drums wreck the spirit of this kind of stuff, but Whitewater by Kyuss is pure desert.

I bought a Scenic record once just because of the impressive brown paper packaging. I didn't go back to the music inside very much though.

The Bruce Kaphan slide guitar thing sounds cool

Probably goes without saying but the new Hired Hand tribute record on Scissor Tail is beautiful and is wide open space music all the way. It's on Spotify if that's your thing.

african desert music (made by people who grew up in and live in deserts!) like BARGOU 08, TAMIKREST, TINARIWEN, and BOMBINO isn't half bad, either

Six Organs of Admittance (especially the albums The Sun Awakens and Shelter From the Ash)

Would including Gil Evans's arrangements be too much of a stretch? Sketches of Spain and parts of Out of the Cool and Indvidualism of... always evoke the desert for me.

Western Skies Motel are good at this stuff. Settlers from last year is great.

Cheers for the Slim Westerns recommendation.

A couple other aesthetics that are distinct but related: I see Dead Texan has been mentioned already, but I want to put in a plug for "Sun Drugs" off the underrated Stars of the Lid release The Ballasted Orchestra, as it totally nails the feeling of laying​ in a wide-open field under a cloudless sky listening to the rumble of distant jet aircraft. Also, the recent GYBE album with the title beginning Asunder, Sweet... gives me a very strong out-of-the-blistering-midday-heat, into-the-cool-shade-of-the-suq vibe

Labradford - Mi Media Naranja

^ good twangy morricone vibes, but also twinkly electronics that make me think of satellites flying across a vast starry sky

Labradford - Mi Media Naranja

^ a midway point between eno and morricone, a desert drifter looking up into the night sky and seeing twinkling satellites sailing across the vastness overhead

Lol fucking phone playing tricks on me

thanks in advance thread

― example (crüt), Sunday, March 19, 2017 1:30 AM (twelve hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Should add for anyone who missed it on the Steve Roach thread that the Dust to Dust mentioned up top which started this is his collaborative album with Roger King:

https://projektrecords.bandcamp.com/album/dust-to-dust

It is and remains one of my all time favorite albums.

If people have mentioned Sketches of Spain the Grateful Dead's lift as Spanish Jam should also fit as should other of their stuff.

I was thinking bits of QMS too especially Calvary.

oh yeah and on the QMS tip there are some longer Rangda pieces ("Plain Of Jars", "...Hermetic Museum") that fit in here, and Sun City Girls' Funeral Mariachi album (but not much else of theirs imo)

this thread was better when it was a little more specialized and not "this drone band used clean guitars and a slide once"

ah yes the long 13hr lifespan of this thread

Brokeback, Brokeback and the Black Rock

William Tyler?

― just sayin, Sunday, March 19, 2017 4:27 AM (eleven hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Absolutely William Tyler!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRGns0huaCM

This is my favorite kind of Calexico and as mentioned above it fits the thread theme very well.

I could certainly recommend the proper instrumental/experimental Calexico stuff if anyone was actually interested.

Train Songs by Two Dollar Guitar.

Brian Grainger – Blue Wheatfield: https://wil-ru.bandcamp.com/album/blue-wheatfield
lots of stuff by Expo '70; e.g., Inaudible Bicoastal Trajectory: https://aguirrerecords.bandcamp.com/album/inaudible-bicoastal-trajectory

https://www.discogs.com/Garlo-Vent-De-Guitares/release/1575820

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jjIhVE7ek4

man I had forgotten about that Two Dollar Guitar album

thanks to crut for those last two as well

probably everyone here has heard Brightblack Morning Light but they definitely fit

Brightblack Morning Light ... WTF?

"Susan Alcorn - And i await the Resurrection (maybe not her best, but its what I have)"

you need to get her extremely lovely Soledad album, Sanpaku or anyone who digs this aesthetic.

I'd take a more desert-focussed Calexcio primer, Evan. Cheers. 'Hot Rail' is fantastic.

Date Palms "Dusted Sessions"

re: Calexico, The Black Light and Spoke are both great for winding/long stretches, southern Utah driving. also, seconding Dirty Three and Tren Brothers. Whatever You Love You Are is a beauty, though it's less propulsive. Bad Timing by Jim O'Rourke is an absolute slam dunk.

I recall Lanterna, who incidentally did a split release with Scenic, being described as "atmospheric desert music" or some such

I loved all the Yo La Tengo music in Old Joy--not sure if that fits your definition, but it does recall the Paris, Texas soundtrack, I think, and they do do a lot of driving in the movie.

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

Yawning Man

Meat Puppets debut and second

http://www.bendingcorners.com/2005/desert_moments/ is a good mix of this sort of thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-px60iPueEk

can't think of much that might fit the "british (or old world in general) landscape music" description though, that is curious

maybe Diamond Mine by King Creosote and Jon Hopkins?

Last year's album Elite Feline by Lotto is a minimalist/mantric guitar trio take. bandcamp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErG7vJ-L5-M

Must be something in the water: Latest Mojo with cover story on The Joshua Tree has an accompanying CD of "desert songs" that seems very, uh, compiled by British rockists who've never been to the desert

Good to see a mention of Giant Sand upthread---here's a little review of their uncrowded expansion I did several years ago---if you don't mind some company way out yonder, more than the occasional lizard etc., it's agreeable:
Giant​ ​Giant​ ​Sand, ​Tucson:​ ​​It's​ ​not​ ​so​ ​uncommon​ ​to​ ​hear​ ​albums​ ​inviting
comparisons​ ​to​ ​spaghetti​ ​western​ ​soundtracks,​ ​but​ ​few​ ​really​ ​'ppreciate​ ​the
possibilities​ ​of​ ​American​ ​and​ ​European​ ​give-and-take:​ ​Latin​ ​in​ ​the
Southwestern​ ​and​ ​Transatlantic​ ​senses,​ ​small​ ​room​ ​jazz​ ​a​ ​la​ ​Weill,
Ellington,​ ​Arizona​ ​highway​ ​lounge;​ ​steel​ ​guitars​ ​and​ ​twang​ ​bars​ ​with
nothing​ ​left​ ​to​ ​prove,​ ​Giant​ ​Sand​ ​(many​ ​of​ ​whom​ ​have​ ​been​ ​Danish​ ​for
some​ ​time) are now ​momentarily ​expanding​ ​into​ ​Giant​ ​Giant​ ​Sand​ ​and​ ​offering​
​​Tucson---which is billed
as​ ​a​ ​country​ ​rock​ ​opera, uh-huh---without​ ​ever​ ​being​ ​anythang​ ​that​ ​can't​ ​be​ ​hitched
to​ ​s​ ​dustcloud​ ​drum​ ​kit,​ ​usually​ ​bouncing​ ​through​ ​stagecoach​ ​ruts.
Sometimes​ ​swinging​ ​a​ ​little,​ ​though​ ​a​ ​droll​ ​drawl​ ​and​ ​and​ ​a​ ​tall​ ​tale​ ​(of​ ​love,
y'all--it's​ ​all​ ​very​ ​romantic,​ ​in​ ​a​ ​worldly,​ ​wide​ ​open​ ​spacey​ ​way).​ ​"You're​ ​so
much​ ​like​ ​the​ ​river/Beautiful,​ ​twisted​ ​and​ ​blue/You​ ​appear​ ​to​ ​be​ ​here
forever/Passin'​ ​through."​ ​And​ ​baby,​ ​it’s​ ​hot​ ​outside.

Also you might want to check the Giant Sand/Howe Gelb thread, or maybe not.

So Floating Points has literally been in the Mojave desert and recorded a load of "wide open desert music" which he is releasing soon.

https://www.floatingpoints.co.uk/

Oof - that sounds interesting. The Mojo CD, not so much.

Also thought about Alan Lamb's wire recordings, but I guess once we get into field recordings the whole thing suddenly widens into incomprehensibility.

Alan Lamb's recordings don't really evoke the desert for me. They're somewhere in the space between the Voyager probe's electromagnetic recordings, Thomas Köner's glacial atmospheres, and contact-mic'd long-string instruments (Alvin Lucier, Ellen Fullman).

Also thought about Alan Lamb's wire recordings, but I guess once we get into field recordings the whole thing suddenly widens into incomprehensibility.

― The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums (Chinaski)

oh god i thought you meant something else when you said "wire recordings"

oh god i thought you meant something else when you said "wire recordings"

Like what?!

Either wire recording or Wire recordings, I imagine.

assuming the former :)

Found this on an old hard drive: https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/left-in-the-desert/

Couple of missteps, but basically full of excellent desert-y goodness (Earth, Lanois, Six Organs, Roach, Ennio etc)

Ikue Mori w/ Robert Quine and Marc Ribot, "Painted Desert."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjxbU-GlVag

I nominate the severely underrated Steven R. Smith:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsFD4Drgs3s

Captain Obvious checking in:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPVexT6itPA&list=PLs2o_po-FzbF0Z_P-l4bQUDAllxLlFdry

Tinariwen:
https://youtu.be/PItnw3Z7WgY

Harold Budd "The Photo of Santiago McKinn" or pretty much all of Dawn's Early Light

that Mori/Quine/Ribot record is excellent and I had forgotten about it, good call

HI DERE (cross-posted from main Eyvind Kang thread for interested parties

A gorgeous set of new tracks by the brilliant composer and multi-instrumentalist Eyvind Kang. It took him a decade and a half to revisit the vibe concocted on his masterpiece from 2001, Live Low To The Earth In The Iron Age, but the wait was worth it. It features an array of spiritually intoxicating instrumentation: tamboura, electric guitar, organ, trumpet, oboe, trombone, and Korean traditional instruments. Eyvind Kang on Plainlight: "In 2002 I wanted to make a kind of sequel to my first solo record on Abduction, Live Low To The Earth In The Iron Age. I found that the 'weight' of sounds seemed to evaporate the compositions. The last thing I wanted to make was a traditional shoegaze recording. 15 years later, I had a strange dream: a voice said 'Because a plainlight has fallen in Heaven, heartbreak would cease.' This statement then became a kind of guiding image and method. Thus, with Korean traditional instruments playing the ostinato and drone, things fell into place. I would like to thank all the musicians, Randall Dunn, Alan Bishop, and each and every listener." Limited edition, one-time pressing; Edition of 400.

That's me well and truly sold - Live Low is magnificent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CP1G-cdRuCM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BZnSC2u7RU

or any Thin White Rope song really...

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a0152862597_16.jpg

Admittedly, the resultant wares don’t stray too far from the crafted templates McPhee has used previously but his capable hands continue, with increasing authority, to render bleakly alluring atmospheres that both express the intimacy of a solitary artisan and the desolation of wide empty landscapes. Hence, the opening “The Blood of St John” unfurls as a slow-motion desert-blues with a shimmering inscrutable underlay; “The Devil’s Knell” drifts along in a buzzing shadowy blur; the more sonically linear “The Rule Of Threes” pirouettes as a madrigal-like meditation; “Dance Macabre” curls yearning slide-playing around a pattern of looped melodic low-end parts; and the closing epic 14-minute title-track sprawls e-bow and slide manipulated figures across a heartbeat-pulsing percussive underbelly.

https://deanmcphee.bandcamp.com/album/four-stones

McPhee is brilliant. Been meaning to check this.

https://barthel-boehm-bauer.bandcamp.com/

Last year's album Elite Feline by Lotto is a minimalist/mantric guitar trio take. bandcamp

― Sanpaku, Saturday, April 8, 2017 11:44 AM (ten months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i would just like to say i've really been liking this, thank you

Would like to nominate “Ain’t Talkin’” by Bob Dylan (Modern Times album) for this thread.

Also: Andean music is pretty much made for this - high desert in particular (e.g., Inti Illimani, Atahualpa Yupanqui)

Co-sign the Lotto album. The Instant Classic label is a goldmine right now.

Bull of Heaven have a (mostly deserved) reputation for being a meme/gimmick/rymbait act, but I must admit that Return of Ghost Sheriff is some of the better desert ambient I've heard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ibu4bdRWCZQ

Thought this would be about Become Desert

My son out of the blue asked me if I'd 'ever been to a desert' before and I sort of have (drove from LA to Vegas, Dungeness is classified as a desert, a couple of the Cape Verde islands, particularly Boa Vista) but damn do I want to go to the desert right now. Doing the next best thing and listening to Paris, Texas.

this is more like a fata morgana in the desert:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3YwOYjrqbQ

some incredible acoustic psych released a few months ago that i believe fits this mold:
https://gardenportal.bandcamp.com/album/beacon

I love them!!!!

really happy we have this connection crut, I am in a FB record geek group with Matt and Jen and it has been great to hear their sound develop.

the solo Rolin and the Powers-Rolin duo recs are more post-Fahey but I agree that Cercyz' singing bowls etc. take this to a different wide-scope psychedelic place

nice! I'm friends w/the dude who runs the label :)

Beacon is a pretty cool record

been lucky to play a handful of times with matt and jen, they are some of nicest people i've ever met and the real deal. happy to see them getting more reknown. true underground stalwarts

they've also been putting on shows at a laundromat in cleveland, and i think it might be the coolest venue in the country. well, was, with covid. you get the idea. imagine seeing bitchin bajas at a laundromat!

SUSS posted the playlist for their recent Ambient Country mix and it's pretty great:

1. Swimming in a Western Hotel - PanAmerican
2. Body in a Room- Bing & Ruth
3. Thresholds ( through a hole in the fence) - Walt McClements
4. News About Heaven- Marisa Anderson, William Tyler
5. Ending- Bruce Langhorne
6. Love Scene - Jerry Garcia
7. When You Sleep - Japancakes
8. Welcome - Harmonia & Eno
9. Desert Rose - Daniel Lanois
10. Anteludium - Luke Schneider
11. Wichita - SUSS
12. Clouds - Bruce Kaphan

Thanks Elvis - this feels right up my alley. Going to check out everything here I've not heard before.

Thinking that Bruce Langhorne's Hired Hand soundtrack is to ambient country as Paul Giovanni's Wicker Man soundtrack is to acid folk

About half of that playlist is new to me and I’m thrilled to find them. Lots to dive into as this is my exact sweet spot these days.

By coincidence I’ve been fiddling around with a playlist to scratch this itch - not just the ambient but also some more traditional songs that rise and fall out of the moodier bits. There is no order to it, and I’m still adding and subtracting as I hone it. But in any case folks on this thread might enjoy this as a kind of radio station. Shuffle away: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1hfogoxEEmNfs3b8eG4u3X?si=rJI-IObaShi0kY4KxuXU9A

This playlist is great pgwp! Thanks for the share.

Thank you! Glad you’re enjoying it.

Cross post from the Fahey thread: the latest Imaginational Anthem compilation, featuring latest pedal steel excursions totally fits this thread's remit: https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/luke-schneider-presents-imaginational-anthem-vol-xi-chrome-universal-a-survey-of-modern-pedal-steel (on Spotify too, if that's your thing).

oo la la, thanks for the cross post

Speaking of SUSS, the new self-titled one, a compilation of four different EPs, is really incredible. I love the vibe.