Close To The Noise Floor

Hi all,

I'm not sure I've mentioned this before, it's taken so long to do. In my day job I've just compiled a 4CD set of 'Formative UK Electronica (1975-1984)' for Cherry Red. I figure it might be of interest to some people here. For some reason the history of electronic music has never reallly been explored or given its due, and I feel quite militant about trying to fill in the gaps in the 'official' history that seems to have become set in stone. This has been two years in the making, so it feels good to finally get it out there. There are a few omissions - people who wouldn't or couldn't license tracks for whatever reason - but in the main it's a fairly enormous overview of the whole scene, a lot of tape label only stuff, some debut releases by more familiar names and, to be frank, pure synth porn in places. I've hardly listened to much else in two years and it's been great. There's a potential Volume II already beginning to take shape on my iPod too.

Anyhow, here's the tracklist. You can check it out on Facebook here too: www.facebook.com/closetothenoisefloor - I hope some of you will find it interesting. In an ideal world it'll generate enough interest to warrant beginning to reissue a few of the original albums too.

Ta,

Richard

One

Five Times Of Dust Computer Bank

The Klingons R.A.M.

Chris And Cosey Re-Education Through Labour

Malcolm Brown Sedation Strokes

Storm Bugs Little Bob Minor

Thomas Leer Tight As A Drum

Blancmange Holiday Camp

Inter City Static Fractured Smile

We Be Echo Sexuality

Bourbonese Qualk God With Us

Nagamatzu Faith

O Yuki Conjugate Disco Song

British Electric Foundation Optimum Chant

Kevin Harrison All Night Long

Voice Of Authority Stopping And Starting

Two

Colin Potter I Am Your Shadow

British Standard Unit D’Ya Think I’m Sexy?

Five Times Of Dust The Single Off The Album

Spöön Fazer Back To The Beginning

Gerry And The Holograms Gerry And The Holograms

The Passage Drugface

John Foxx A New Kind Of Man (Alternative Version)

100% Manmade Fibre Green For Go

Those Little Aliens Sentimental

Final Program Protect And Survive

The Human League Being Boiled

Instant Automatons New Muzak

Cultural Amnesia Materialistic Man

Worldbackwards (Leaving Me) Now

Alan Burnham Music To Save The World By

Orchestral Manoeuvers In The Dark Almost

Eyeless In Gaza Kodak Ghosts Run Amok

Schleimer K Broken Vein

Native Europe The Distance From Köln

Three

Zorch Adrenalin (Return of the Elohim Pt 1)

Sea Of Wires Robot Dance

Ron Berry Sea Of Tranquility

MFH Mistral

Adrian Smith Joe Goes To New York

Mark Shreeve Embryo (Extract)

EG Oblique Graph Triptych

Carl Matthews Encounter

Paul Nagle Ynys Scaith

O Yuki Conjugate Sedation

Konstruktivist Western Vein

Attrition Dead Of Night (Excerpt)

Four

Throbbing Gristle What A Day

A Tent No Way Of Knowing

Portion Control Go For The Throat

DC3 Eco Beat

Renaldo And The Loaf Dying Inside

Blah Blah Blah In The Army

Legendary Pink Dots God Speed

Muslimgauze Muslin Gauze Muslim Prayer

Suisse Live At Longborne

Alien Brains Menial Disorders, Extract B2

Storm Bugs Himeal (And She Blew)

Third Door From The Left In The Room

Al Robertson Dignity Of Labour

bcGilbert, gLewis, russell Mills Mzui (Extract)

This looks really interesting. Definitely want to give it a listen.

I would seriously like to own this, seems a lot of thought/research has gone into it. Will it have a digital release too?

  On 4/24/2016 at 3:20 PM, clevreuse said:

I would seriously like to own this, seems a lot of thought/research has gone into it. Will it have a digital release too?

Hey,

Thanks to anybody who checked this out, bought it etc - it should be available digitally from the usual suspects too.

If you subscribe to Electronic Sound Magazine, you might be interested to know we're the cover article for their first print edition: http://electronicsound.co.uk/product/issue-2-0-printed-edition/

Volume II is in the works as I type, so watch this space...

Ta,

Richard

Nice, definitely getting this digitally. The physical version shipped from the UK is pricey. Such beautiful presentation though.

I'm told this will be available digitally next Friday. Some delay with it all I don't quite understand, but I don't get paid to understand :)

Thanks all,

Richard

this looks awesome

  On 5/29/2016 at 11:33 AM, Ohm said:

I'm told this will be available digitally next Friday. Some delay with it all I don't quite understand

Brilliant, i'll be getting it then :) though I do want to own the physical thing eventually.. Thanks for all the work you've put in

Wow, looks like a proper labour of love getting all that together. Well done, and just treated myself to a copy as I feel I should know more of those artists than I do.

Thanks folks - yep, 'Why don't I know more of these people?' was a question I kept asking myself as I put this together and kept uncovering more amazing stuff. Can't wait for more of the same on Volume 2.

For those who asked, by the way, here's a link to the digital version.... I can't recommend the physical highly enough - the sleevenotes by the artists tell as much of a story as the music - but this'll do the job as far as your ears are concerned :)

Richard

Got my copy! Really quick delivery. CD1 is full of great grooves and quirky stuff, I'm going to see me listening to this a lot.

The Sleeve notes are comprehensive and informative from what I've read so far.

This should go in the main "new releases" forum as you'd get more coverage / sell more copies there

Thanks fletcher - is there a rule against double posting? I'll post on the other page and see what happens.....

Volume II is in the works now, some great stuff popping up. ETA February, I think.

Ta,

Richard

Two identical threads isn't efficient, so I merged the two. I'll keep it in New & Upcoming releases though, where it should be :)!

Really interesting curation, a lot of names you definitely don't see in these compilations a lot. Will certainly have to dig into this, thanks for sharing!

This is amazing and it deserves to be in this forum - hope you manage to flog a few more copies.

Constant rotation in my car for the past week alongside elseq.

Some dark stuff on CD4 - that "in the army" track cracks me up / freaks me out! Great stuff all round and some real gems to be found. Looking forward to volume II.

*edit*

shit wrong thread

Hello again,

Just a heads up - we're putting on a little thing here in Somerset if anybody is local and fancies it.

There's also a European 'Volume II' just about to be announced, which is great (I think/hope).

Anyway, here's the details of the live thing:

Close To The Noise Floor
Vintage Electronica All-Dayer
 
Banco De Gaia
Colin Potter
Attrition
Paul Nagle
Mark (Instant) Automaton
Sweet Machine
Gene Serene
Laugh Clown Laugh
Music Of The Andys
S.H.I.F.T.Y.

Silk Mill Studios, Frome
Saturday May 27th 2017
1pm til 11pm
Bar/Food/Record Stall

All-day tickets £15 from:
Raves From The Grave, Frome
By email: raves@btconnect.com
Or via: www.facebook.com/closetothenoisefloor

Oh wow, great news on volume 2. I still listen to v1 loads.

I'll pass the details for the live show on to some mates who live down that way.

Edit

In fact, it's not out of the question for me to visit, I'm halfway between Oxford and Swindon. Will look into the logistics although we have a baby due early May so day trips might be off the cards....

Just to confirm that Volume II is now in the can, and due out in July. I'm really happpy with the line-up:

Disc One:

Die Gesunden - Die Gesunden Kommen
André De Koning - Party Talk
Pseudo Code - She's Got Blue Eyes Wow
DAF - Ich Will
De Fabriek - Claxon
Cluster - Caramel
NSRD - Invalīdu Tramvajs
Daniele Ciullini - Marbles In The Garden
Universalanschluss - Krematorien
Truus de Groot - NY NY
Christina Kubisch - Speak & Spell
Yello - Glue Head
Famlende Forsøk - Tror Nok Jeg Levde...En Gang
Borghesia - Secret Affair No 2
Schaltkreis Wassermann - Lux
M.A.L. - C33H35N5O5 (Ergotamine)
Gagarin-Kombinaatti - Ukaasi
Saal 2 - Die Internationale

I think there'll be a piece in 'Electronic Sound' as per the original, all that stuff. Hopefully people will go for it and a few folk here will find it interesting. 1974-1984.

www.facebook.com/closetothenoisefloor if anybody wants to know more.

Just a bump on this - Noise Reduction System is out on July 21st and getting a great response so far.... You can find out all about it and pre-order here....

https://www.cherryred.co.uk/product/noise-reduction-system-formative-european-electronica-1974-1984/

Enjoy!

A great review of this in Electronic Sound, courtesy of Kris Needs (legend!).....

Looking forward to this. Hopefully my wife has come good and ordered it for my birthday as requested!

  On 7/17/2017 at 8:05 AM, fletcher said:

Looking forward to this. Hopefully my wife has come good and ordered it for my birthday as requested!

Fingers crossed!

It seems to be going over well - lots of good reviews, happy artists etc. Job done.

  On 7/30/2017 at 12:09 PM, Ohm said:

 

  On 7/17/2017 at 8:05 AM, fletcher said:

Looking forward to this. Hopefully my wife has come good and ordered it for my birthday as requested!

 

Fingers crossed!

 

It seems to be going over well - lots of good reviews, happy artists etc. Job done.

 

Well, she didn't order it.  I even sent her the link to the cherry red website twice plus various other hints.

Anyway, have ordered it myself, looking forward to hearing it all, it has indeed been getting some good reviews.

This is great, btw.

At first it didn't hit as hard as the first compilation, but after a few repeated listens I can now safely saw its easily just as good as the first release.

Disc 2 and 3 currently favourites, with "Ruth - Polaroid/Roman/Photo (Instrumental First Mix)" being standout track - I think i've heard this elsewhere, possibly on a Fabric mix CD or a back to mine perhaps?

Some great music in here, highly recommended if you like digging into where what we currently listen to came from.

And i've not even opened the sleeve notes yet