ambient underworld

[crank]

Dub Jam was nice. quite nice.

[combustible pants]

well thanks for all the lovly replies...plenty of stuff to keep me going

i need a copy of dubjam...its lovely....maybe underworld would consider doing a compilation of their quieter moments??

heres hoping

[ultradave]

...so I read through the tracks and was surprised no one mentioned these excellent tracks:

Jam Scraper - From the Mmm...Skyscraper I Love You Single

Please Help Me - From the Push Upstairs Single

Peach Tree - From the Crocodile Single

Born Slippy (Down Version) - Born Slippy 2003 Single

and also if you haven't heard, it's pretty good by Warb - Born Sleepy.

[BrotherLovesDub]

how the fuck is Jam Scraper ambient? how the fuck is Oich Oich ambient. i think some people need to investigate what 'ambient' means. here's a clue. if it's 126 bpm with a straight kick drum through most of the track, it's not ambient. plinky plonky intros ≠ ambient.

[ultradave]

Originally Posted by BrotherLovesDub

if it's 126 bpm with a straight kick drum through most of the track, it's not ambient.

that's open for interpretation. when you sum it all up regardless of bpm, it's all electronic music. what's ambient to one person differs from another.

just enjoy the music!

[BrotherLovesDub]

Jam Scraper has layers of percussion and an acid line. It's not open for interpretation. It's in no way ambient.

[BrotherLovesDub]

Atmospheric ≠ Ambient.

http://www.ambientmusicguide.com/pages/history.php

Have you read Ambient Century? I highly recommend it.

[crank]

truth be told Dub Jam isn't too ambient. I didn't actually mean to post that on this here part of the forum neither.

[holden]

Originally Posted by ultradave

that's open for interpretation. when you sum it all up regardless of bpm, it's all electronic music. what's ambient to one person differs from another.

Agreed. As per Brian Eno, "Mr. Ambient" himself:
"Ambient Music is intended to induce calm and a space to think." - 1978

That's a pretty broad definition. Good! Music should never be restrictive or restricted.

Excellent article, BLD...definitely raises the issues of subgenres and overuse of the term. But still, i'm not sure i like rules for what qualifies as this or that style of music (i'm fondly remembering a discussion we had on here where i tried to convince Stimpee that UW had elements of Progressive Rock!)...for every "rule" there's an exception, and bands like UW that are adept at perfoning a lot of styles of music, it's even harder to classify.

When i was younger, "ambient" meant New Age and World Music I heard on public radio and my dad's Windham Hill records. More recently, i might have considered beatless tracks to be the definition. Then i learned about drone, soundscapes, noise, lo-fi, electroacoustic, blah blah etc...

I also agree that acid squelches or somewhat fast beats might not be calming or space-inducing to most, but i can see how a steady tempo and repeated loops can be hypnotic and comforting in their regularity. Is that ambient? For some.

For me, the most "ambient" Underworld compositions are several tracks on "Breaking & Entering" OST and the "I'm a Big Sister..." Riverrun EP. Not sure I'd call anything on their studio albums ambient. A number ofthe aforementioned Dark and Long mixes and B-sides, maybe.

[BrotherLovesDub]

Plastickman's Consumed album is full of steady kick drums but is very ambient, in my opinion. Steady kicks alone wouldn't disqualify a song from being ambient, but if we're going to have a thread for Ambient Underworld and people are including Jam Scraper and Oich Oich, what's to stop someone from listing Jumbo or Minneapolis as ambient?