Rolling ambient/chill out/drone/moodz thread: from 2010s 'til infinity!

Oh yeah, that's good stuff.

Dream Carpets too

https://youtu.be/a4-HcZAa_Yo?list=PLN3rJSAGi0v3ryuJL7eQ5PGrc3J6ePpj5

http://www.discogs.com/Alva-Noto-Xerrox-Vol2/release/1610507

alva noto - xerrox vol. 2 -- similar to tim hecker's work, though it's more exquisite.. super-fine textures and tonal zones. volume 3 was released this year, but it doesn't feel so well-realized.

xxxp

There is an excellent Silent Season comp. Asc has made 2 excellent albums this year and I quite dig Purl and a couple of years back I absolutely loved the Segue album, their follow up - not on SS - wasn't much cop though. They are not the most prolific of labels but I really admire their commitment to such a good aesthetic.

Wow @ this thread. So much to catch up on.

I'm serious about that Heathered Pearls album, it was one of those "I've been hearing this music in my head all my life" experiences

xerrox vol. 3 is fantastic imo, probably my favourite of 2015 in this vein

Asc has made 2 excellent albums this year

Yeah was about to mention that, I really liked Imagine The Future even though it sounds at times a bit too close to FSOL and Burial. Fervent Dream is the minimalist one, I have only just got that but sounds great on first listen.

If we can recommend stuff that's a bit older, last year Oliver Lieb released Inside Voices (on Psychonavigation), his first ambient record in 20 years, and it's amazing!

Speaking of techno artists releasing surprise ambient albums ...

http://editionsmego.com/release/EMEGO-215

I checked the Silent Season bandcamp page, but it seems all their CDs are sold out, even the one that came last month. :( And I'm not really into paying 12$ + taxes for a digital release alone. Do you have to like pre-order their stuff so you might get a copy?

I'm a big fan of Natalie Beridze/TBA, and enjoyed her ambient album this year, "Between The Naps," which also included her prepared piano pieces (not "prepared" in the John Cage sense, more like programmed via computer)
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUSRfoOcUe4b-Ok7VE3lQNYCIiuA4b_Um

She's also on the Gacha album "Send Two Sunsets," which isn't entirely ambient, but is mostly downtempo/lush. One of my faves this year.
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLu6sgxcUkSyMfFg3kgEmZ5MSmFW_PWbkC

if only that surgeon was on cd.
sounds fantastic.

Anyways, speaking of decent prizes for digital music, I noticed you can buy all the digital releases (excluding the two of her albums which have been released on CD) by French ambient producer Zalys for 4.50 Euros or more:

https://zalys.bandcamp.com/

Her music is very traditional space ambient, just glacial cosmic drones and synths with no beats, so there's few surprises there, but if this kind of "slowly drifting through galaxies" music appeals to you (as it does to me), you get over 5 hours of that stuff for peanuts.

the best new-to-me ambient album i have heard this year is the lisa gerrard album, the silver tree.
gorgeous vocals/production/sonic detail.
dark sounds vs layers vs production.
i mentioned this on the dedicated LG thread a few weeks ago and the fact that i was willing to send out cd copies to anyone interested given that the cds were being sold for bobbins.
i will of course extend that offer to the folks on this thread,
however, i will not be able to go back to the shop for a couple of weeks, due to the festive chaos, and so, there is a high probability that all of the cd copies will have been picked up by then.
but just in case.
and yes, the album is that good.
deep sensual trip hop styled ambience.
basically, the kinda stuff that soundtracks fragence adverts this time of year.

http://www.thesirenssound.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Jocelyn-Pook-Untold-Things.jpg

surely i am not the only person that thinks this is special ?

many x-posts but thank you xelab + others for the silent season recs :D

another one I've returned to quite a bit:
https://25000kittens.bandcamp.com/

very new agey & soothing, I often put it on while studying

essential:

http://www.discogs.com/Suzanne-Kraft-Talk-From-Home/release/7110013

one of my fav lps this year

the jonny nash LP on the same label is also excellent

spent so much time w/gas POP, didn't realize that Zauberberg is the real masterpiece.

they're all great but pop is not my fav!

zauberberg maybe best at invoking that sensation of motion without movement he does so well.

while we're violating the thread criteria, and since it doesn't seem to have gotten much attention here, leyland kirby's "sadly the future is no longer what it was" is my most cherished thing in this neighborhood from the past several years. it affects me so much it's kind of embarrassing: https://leylandkirby.bandcamp.com/album/sadly-the-future-is-no-longer-what-it-was

also haven't quite found a way into KAS's "euclid" like i have "tides," as others said.

loving heathered pearls from stuff posted i've listened to so far, thanks.

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

yeaahhh

http://vektroid.bandcamp.com/album/polytravellers

I've listened to "Euclid" several times this week and I'm beginning to appreciate it more and more... I guess my initial problem was that I expected it to be an ambient album of some sort, but really it's much more in Mouse on Mars vein, finding childlike joy in these hyperenergetic bursts of pretty sounds. I understand why this kinds of ADHD approach to electronic music can get tiring, but on the level of pure sonics I haven't heard a better thing this year.

Another valuable thread from Tuomas...

This wasn't my biggest year for ambient/etc. listening, and most of my favorites have been mentioned, including Jonas Munk's Absorb/Fabric/Cascade and Steve Hauschildt's Where All Is Fled. Does the Munk sample Steve Reich's Music for 18 Musicians, or just closely emulate it?

One 2015 treasure not yet noted here is Asmus Tietchens - Ornamente (Zwischen Null und Eins) (https://lineimprint.bandcamp.com/album/ornamente-zwischen-null-und-eins). Wonderfully delicate, transparent music made from inharmonic specks and washes of digital sound. Tietchens is evidently quite prolific, but new to me, I found the album via SFJ's 2015 EOY list (http://yearendlists.com/2015/12/sasha-frere-jones-89-favorite-albums-of-2015/).

http://dustedmagazine.tumblr.com/post/126440900914/joseph-clayton-millssifr-suppedaneum

plain and affecting, this is therapeutic listening

huntress is great too

I'm guessing everybody is too chilled out to rave about that Heathered Pearls album. I'm serious, if you like Gas or the melodic stuff on SAW 2... you will not be disappointed. No I'm not street teaming I just really really love this record.

ALSO: Strike by 154 (aka newworldaquarium) is a semi-recent classic of very minimal gauzy warm ambient house (as much as Gas is ambient house, anyway)

Strike is like a real time soundtrack of watching the sun set over a smog filled city

copped the Loyal album upon seeing the first mention of it, but have barely listened to it. it's pleasant, though. the music has a warm, degraded quality.. like it's worn. parts of it reminded me of philip jeck, with the repetition and delay. but it's more sweet, melodic. also, the fun years. strong 'the fun years' vibe

Yeah, that sweet warm degraded sound.. It's like van halen's brown sound compared to top flight sterile robot crap

http://www.discogs.com/Minus-A-Rainy-Koran-Verse-UK-Live/release/629227

breaking the rule again, but i heard this just recently. if you've any love for the final track of I'm Happy, and I'm Singing, and a 1, 2, 3, 4 by jim o'rourke, it's up your alley.. it's really spare but it has a similar sense of bittersweet/melancholy. not pulse-oriented, however

just gave that heathered pearls album a listen while hugging a napping cat <3 it is v beautiful, thank you for the rec

something about it reminds me of a hazier ver of the yume nikki ost in a way i am finding it hard to articulate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGM8-YN5B64

the loops feel v sweet & emotional on tracks like "left climber". it's like gas, yes...

curious about this label: http://www.discogs.com/label/19403-Spekk

ambient labels should strive for more individuality. i really hate "movie soundtrack" ambient. i even started a dumb thread about it, i think!

http://s3-origin-images.politico.com/news/101007_lou_dobbs_face_ap_328.jpg

https://youtu.be/9bCPU305vpE

Dirk Serries + Rutger Zuydervelt - Buoyant (album preview)

has a sort of Fennesz/Stars of the Lid vibe.. pleasant

Eleh – Homage is incredible: http://open.spotify.com/album/5wiZraNKzkUN6CwbXJnVAF

I love this album art, too. Not sure if it was on the original or just the reissue.

http://importantrecords.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/release_full/imprec/homage_final_0.jpg

slsk'ing it now, thanks :)

You know when you come across an album and it's so directly in your sweet spot you might as well have pulled the thing out of your heart? Why did I only just discover Eyvind Kang's Live Low to the Earth, in the Iron Age? Absolutely glorious.

The Omni Vu Deity album that Tuomas recommended is really hitting the spot

In case you want to discuss more historical vibes, I've continued my poll series of years in ambient albums with a new 1992 poll:

1992, A Wonderful Year in Ambient Music: Poll and Discussion

And here are the earlier polls in the series:

1994: The greatest year for Ambient music? Poll and discussion

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

just now hearing the Lee Gamble album, KOCH (2014).. fucking excellent ambient music

this is really lovely, koto + piano with lots of tape and synth processing:
https://psychictroublestapes.bandcamp.com/album/maxwell-august-croy-kaniza

i wish people would use higher quality tape stock when putting albums out on cassette.. assuming the Croy release is a normal bias cassette. you've got labels like Notice Recordings putting their music out on chrome bias (type ii) and cobalt tape stock (at a cheaper price), and it sounds great. these Kaniza sounds are pretty sweet, btw. http://dustedmagazine.com/reviews/7113, the sample song is a real beaut.

i did a chrome tape last year and they came out really nice, thought it was relatively inexpensive too.

I'm not sure whether to post this here, or the techno thread (it has beats, but the mood is pretty ambient), but I'm vibing hard on Cio D'Or's new album on Semantica: https://semanticarecords.bandcamp.com/album/cio-dor-all-in-all-semantica-73cd

It kinda reminds of the album Monolake did a few years ago with all the PVC pipe percussion, except that her approach is more streamline and appealing, you can just zoom in on individual SOUNDS! Everything is so well-defined and meticulously placed, it's almost like anti-drone. Too bad I didn't get this album until this week, otherwise I would've nommed it in the ILM EOY poll.

(maybe wrong thread but) I've listened to the new Roly Porter 'Third Law' 3 times in a row now. It feels like being on a trip through the dark, deep space.

yeah i don't know whether to post things like that on the 'techno doing it wrong thread' or what

Countersign the Roly Porter rec. My robots at work said I would like it, and I didn't immediately believe them because I didn't recognize the name and it sounds goofy. But they were really right.

Not sure where to put this, but I would have nominated it for the EOY poll if I had heard it a few weeks ago (came out in December). Pretty stunning electronics + Rhodes + vocal improvisations.

Joseph Branciforte + Theo Bleckmann - LP2
https://josephbrancifortetheobleckmann.bandcamp.com/album/lp2

no idea who ferdi schuster is but this rules

https://cosimapitz.bandcamp.com/album/nun

YES!!

I recently discovered that label exploring Gespensterland connections, love most of it

same label also did this stunning 90-minute tape of Arvo Part on guitar

https://cosimapitz.bandcamp.com/album/wherever-i-go

(which I fell asleep to just last night)

damn, i can already tell i'm gonna play the shit out of this

ha I immediately bought like six tapes from that label, the Balruin and Spiritual Emojis ones are good too

*Baldruin

Part album is sounding very lovely, ty sleeve

<3

immense vibe on this track

https://ufordia.bandcamp.com/track/earth-love

This is more like a film score than ambient music per se, but it's super good

https://svbkvlt.bandcamp.com/album/ministry-of-tall-tales