I Am The Center: Private Issue New Age In America 1950-1990 -
Various Artists
Totally diggin these mellow vibes man. Some of my/your favourite new age/ambient heroes are here like Laraaji, Iasos, Don Slepain, Constance Demby, Michael Stearns & Larkin. Then there's a whole bunch of fellow astral travellers I've not heard of like Judith Trip, Daniel Emmanuel... The best discovery for me here is Aeoliah who gives us 11 and a half minutes of cosmic ear candy, waves of plinky keyboards give way to moon desert guitar bliss to free your mind on the track Tien Fu: Heaven's Gate. That Constance Demby track is killer and indicates her influence on the neo-cosmic underground er.. hello Motion Sickness Of Time Travel. Actually this compilation probably would never have come out if its artists weren't such a big influence on the whole hypnagogic/vapourwave scene of the last few years. This once reviled genre (new age) continues its much warranted rehabilitation. Fans of the excellent but now inactive blog Crystal Vibrations rejoice, your album of the year has arrived.
Cosmic Machine: A Voyage across French Cosmic & Electronic Avant Garde (1970-1980) - Various Artists
When I read that an LP was coming out with that title I got very excited. I thought 'Yeah about time the French got their due in respect this kind of gear.' I guess I was expecting to hear from the likes of Heldon, Spacecrft, Fondation, Patrick Vian, Illitch, Thierry Muller, Metal Urbain, Puzzle etc and maybe a bit of French library by Jean Pierre Decerf or Bernard Fevre. Anyway Fevre appears but none of the rest do. France's 3 most famous musical exports appear however ie. Serge Gainsbourg, Jean-Michel Jarre & Jean-Jaques Perry. I possibly would have used the word pop in the title like 'A Voyage Across French Electronic Pop.' but hey that's not gonna fit for the market they're aiming for though is it? Semantics aside this is a good survey of 70s electronic pop French stylee much of which I'm unaware of.
Bandidos OST - Egisto Macchi (1967)
Choice Spaghetti Western soundtrack from possibly my favourite Italian soundtrack/library composer. We all need more of this in our lives. We should all live like we're in a Spaghetti Western doncha think? I don't know even what that means. Oh dear.....
The Living Dead At The Manchester Morgue OST-Giuliano Sorgini
This tedious film had like 15 different names and it was set up north in the UK but it was Spanish! Sorgini is Italian and I'd previously heard his Under Pompelmo LP which was some funky shit from 1973 and also went under a different name, London Transport! That's all very confusing isn't it? This soundtrack however is one of the best Italian horror soundtracks ever. Its up there with Goblin's Suspiria and Profundo Rosso, Riz Ortilani's Cannibal Holocaust, Morricone's Argento trilogy, Libra's Schock, Nico Findenco's Zombie Holocaust er... and the list goes on. This soundtrack from 1974 has all the right spooky psych-funk vibes with strings, electronics and awesome drumming. The atmospheres are creepy with haunted organs and witchy woodwinds. Sinister laughing and screams permeate the soundtrack and I loves it.
