OCRB: Imaginary Softwoods..

Apparently, I buy too many records

My wife Helen, like every other woman i've ever lived with, believes that I buy too many records.

Which, as every record-buying man knows, is a ridiculous belief.

I will concede, however, that I do indeed buy a lot of records and that I don't afford them the same amount of listens and attention that I did 20 or 30 years ago.

To this end, I have decided to blog about the records that I buy, in order to help my appreciation of them - and perhaps to show Helen that I don't buy that many records after all.

Because i'm crap with deadlines the blog posts will be sporadic and probably be about a month or 2 behind but that's just the way i am! The posts will not necessarily be actual reviews (most likely comments, at best) and will generally be pretty damn short due to the reasons outlined above. As a writer in a previous existence i have decided not to worry about writing as art in the pieces but, instead, to attempt to convey feeling over semantic (and often grammatic) perfection.

And 'OCRB'? It stands for 'Obsessive Compulsive Record Buying' - a little known mental health affliction that is potentially damaging to the bank account but ultimately life-affirming. It is sad.......but a nice form of sad.

Monday, 5 December 2011

Imaginary Softwoods: S/T (Digitalis)

Originally released as a triple cassette in 2008, the vinyl reissue has been remastered by James Plotkin - spreading the 12 tracks over 4 sides of droning metallic near-beauty. Being that it was recorded before the last Imaginary Softwoods LP i reviewed previously, it would seem that it is a bit darker than that one. This has harsher tones and does not emanate with lushness as much as the other - but this harshness serves as a wake-up call to someone such as i, who has dined out on so much analog beauty this year. It's an occasional electronic kick up the arse for me and a reminder that John Elliott's power lies in his ability to manipulate his sounds into definitive moodscapes, not just in his ability to produce lilting beauty.

There is nothing wrong with having music challenge your preconceptions, in fact it is vital that music does this in order to side-swipe us out of mundanity and medoicrity. As each track drifts into earshot i am frequently surprised and equally frequently elated as to the pulses of sound that pour out of my speakers.

A hugely rewarding listen that, at times, unsettles me but never ceases to en-thrall me and leaves me hungry for the whole back catalogue, in order to see where he will take me next.

Friday, 21 October 2011

Imaginary Softwoods: The path of Spectrolite (Amethyst Sunset)

Imaginary Softwoods is John Elliott from the massively prolific Emeralds and these ambient synthscapes are beautifully lush and luminescent. They float around between the speakers in an expansive room-filling manner that hijacks your thoughts, commands you to take notice and attempt to follow the ever-evolving twists and turns. Which is exceedingly hard to do.

I bought a copy of this for Matt the Hat at the same time as i bought it for myself (he trusts my judgement, as should you!) and gave it to him by saying "it's a perfect tangerine dream tribute". Whilst the album certainly references TD, and Klaus Schulze's more ambient solo releases in particular, i did it a huge disservice by describing it thus - as it is much more than that, Elliott has blended his own sensibilities into each track that means they stand out as very individual pieces of music. There's a lot of this stuff around at the moment - but this stands out as special as each track is a musical feast, with a great structure sadly lacking from a lot of ambient analog electronic music. It is all too easy to set a few tones going and leave the room for half an hour, and call it an ambient drone, some of us demand much more.