Luke Vibert's Nuggets 3

Just discovered this on i-tunes today and couldn't wait for the vinyl so I downloaded it. This is Luke Vibert's 3rd volume of selections taken from various library music archives. Volume 3 is material taken exclusively from the Bruton Library vaults I believe. Volume I had tunes from Chappell, Southern, IM and PIL music libraries and was where i discovered such luminaries as Roger Roger and Nino Nardini. Further Nuggets was the second volume in this series and was my introduction to the likes of Eric Peters, Bernard Fevre and Roger Davey. Since the release of those two compilations over 10 years ago now, we are all a lot more informed about music libraries thanks to the many blogs that popped up specialising in this music. Many library classics and not so classics (there's a lot more of those) have been shared and heard thanks to the likes of Funky Frolic, Dusty Shelf, Val Verde Music, Retro-Teque, Library Music Rarities et al. Many of these blogs though have now closed down. Anyway thanks to those legendary bloggers I am well aware of the Bruton catalogue. Having said that many of the tunes on Nuggets 3 I've not heard.  Down-tempo crime funk, space age disco and car chase themes are the order of the day here. However there are some anomalies. Scratch City is as the title hints a scratching hip hop jam!? Adrian Baker & Ray Morgan give us the Beach Boy-esque In Close Harmony while Bill Campbell & Aaron Harry throw up (apt word for it) Galaxy a Reggae tune! Alan Hawkshaw and Brian Bennett both make several excellent contributions ensuring that this collection's status goes beyond mere novelty. The discovery for me though is these five tracks from Francis Monkman (The prog guy of Curved Air/Sky fame). These top synthetic noir funk jams sound like they could be coming out of today's underground. Now where are all those library music files.....

Emeralds - Just To Feel Anything

I've been meaning to write about Emeralds new LP Just to Feel Anything since I mentioned it in a previous post. I've had notes scribbled down for over a month now. Anyway my computer is playing up or is it blogger? Doing a post at the moment is quite frustrating. Anyway Emeralds are a group I thought were really going to push through some kind of sound barrier into something new, not just update the Kosmiche stylee. I think maybe they previously came close or did bring something new to the Kosmiche table. Perhaps it's my recent Back To The Future phase ie. re/listening to UK hardcore/Darkside/Jungle etc. that has put some things into perspective. In the early 90s the future was really actually happening.  This new Emeralds LP seems to be their most retro and least forward thrusting to date. I think they've added beats. Did any of the other LPs have beats? In my notes I have written (and this is from a while ago):

Nostalgia for Top Gun,
Nostalgia for Dire Straits,
Nostalgia for Harmonia,
Nostalgia for Arcade games,
Nostalgia for Pink Floyd,
Nostalgia for Cluster,
Nostalgia for Bruton Music's BRK series of library LPs.

Nostalgia for the future might be what I'm trying to project onto them. I mean this is nostalgia for the future but an older future. Not a future so much rooted in the UK early 90s so much as a 70s/80s vision of the future. If nobody is going into a new future can I value one vision of future over another? Who's being more cynical me or Emeralds?

Anyway having said all that it's another top record from Emeralds albeit one that's a little more guitar centric. Atmospheric, sad, uplifting and beautiful as usual. Nice. Is that enough?