Bleep-bloop-chirrup

Continuing my trip back through the 1994 album charts.

29/05/94 : Lifeforms - The Future Sound Of London


I'm surprised to see this but very happy to do so - it's another one I owned (ten for the year) but I've not listened to it in ages.

And part of that is because, at 92 minutes, it's not a casual listen. But, whilst I realise for many this is just an odd collection of bleeps and random noises, I really like this album - I think it's possibly peak ambient (whilst accepting that ambient is a phrase that covers a multitude of sins). It starts off with "Cascade" which is just a great track and just gently burbles its way through with some great sounds and rhythms which do indeed suggest lifeforms, without really giving you any clue what's going on. I think it's not an album you have to actively listen to it, but it still creates a mood which I really dig and it's not, unlike plenty of its contemporaries, overly repetitive - it also has some great track names including "Dead Skin Cells", "Spineless Jelly", "Vertical Pig" and "Vit".

We're at #6 in the charts this week on the start of a six week run which features a drop in every week. The top five this week were Seal (a new entry), Deacon Blue, The Cranberries, Erasure and Eternal with the next highest new entry being Beastie Boys (#10). 

WIkipedia tells us its their second album and there are some interesting people involved in the album including Robert Fripp, Ozric Tentacles and Talvin Singh. That's about it for the album but I dug out a top bit of trivia from their entry - the girl on the cover, Sheuneen Ta (aka "Witch Girl") went on play football for Arsenal. Critically the album was very well received with AllMusic calling it "an inventive, fascinating aural experience" - commercially, it didn't do anything away from these shores but I suspect it did waaaay better here than they were expecting.

discogs.com tells us you're going to have to spend the princely sum of £4 to get a decent CD copy but if you want a vinyl copy it's going to set you back quite a bit more with the most expensive one being £196.11! I appreciate this album isn't for everyone but I love it and think it's a classic of its kind, so was very pleased to catch up with it.

22/05/94 - Not as bad as it could have been
05/06/94 - Not as fun as I hoped

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