fredart : blogbits

It’s been a long time since i’ve done any blogging, ranting or posting, which is silly when you consider how easy it is to post such things these days.  It’s kind of like Kalium said in a twitter response earlier - i’ve got more than enough to blurp about, i just need to start doing it where i’m supposed to rather than just to friends online.  So without further blathering, I’ll put this rather delightful WordPress interface for this particular blog to work.

If you’ve been following MT or reading my blog for any length of time at all, you know that i have some odd and wide ranging taste in music, most of it chosen to either compliment or contrast whatever mood i happen to be in at the time.  I’m a particular fan of various types of Ambient music, running the range from the dreamy, spacey and sometimes kinda silly stuff like John Serrie to the sometimes rather alarming sounds from artists like Infetu and Karjalan Sissit.  It’s really hard to figure out if a particular ambient track or work is going to be something you enjoy or are able to listen to over time because it’s kind of a subconscious listen.  The best tracks are the ones that leave you with the atmosphere and the mood without giving you anything to grasp that sticks in your head and identifies the tune.  Consciously hearing the track as it comes on means that it’s not going to have the effect you are looking for.  You don’t WANT it to grab your attention.

Which is a little dumb if you are creating a track list or looking for stuff to listen to.  :P  I pluck stuff from itunes or amazon or other places quite regularly, but yesterday i picked up download that is something i’ve actually been hoping to find for quite a while: Gas - Pop.  Even better, it wasn’t just Pop, it was three other disks by this guy as well in a ‘box’ set called Nah Und Fern.   Itunes has it, but i got it for a much better price over at bleep.com, a download shop with a pretty specific collection of labels to choose from.

Gas is some earlier work by influential techno artist Wolfgang Voigt who released these works almost 10 years ago (Gas (1996), Zauberberg (1997), and Königsforst (1999), Pop (2000)) but evertime i heard something from Pop on one of the ambient shoutcast stations i listen to from time to time, i would make note of it and try to find it.  Just the other day, when looking at some of my bookmarks on ambient music, i brought up a page on Gas and after poking around for a bit found that some of his work had been released recently on itunes.  Then i came across this CD, and i felt it was one i really should get.  It’s easy on the ears, which just enough structure to it to wander, and it seems to really be saturated with the kinds of moods i am always looking for in ambient music. I’ve listened through a number of times now and it’s definately been worth getting.

Just for the heck of it, i’ll try putting Bleep’s little player here so you can give it a listen.  Lemme know if this thing blows up your browsers

So much for a super quick post.