Orbital are no more and I'm a little sad about that. For one thing it'll break a yearly tradition my friends and I had of going to see them, dancing like infants who've just discovered their fingers and smiling like mad every time they played the intro to 'Satan' or 'Dr Who'. And hearing the bagpipes and Suzi Quatro version of 'Style' on a crappy radio in a very dodgy bedsit while being harassed by a heroin-addled Scot wearing nothing but tattoos, spinach and a kilt is one of my fondest memories.
Orbital were one of the greatest ever pure techno bands and Chime and Belfast were two of the first pure techno 12"s I ever owned (no one still counts that early Chicago nonsense, do they? I tried to Jack my Body but it just wouldn't stay jacked; kept fliping back out into something altogether more peculiar).
Their music sometimes got frighteningly close to Jean Michel Jarre and that was always part of the thrill: they straddled the head-down stomp n gurn techo blast and the meandering prog divide so well and with such grace (and good tunes; unlike a lot of their peers they never really forgot that sometimes music is just about tunes you can whistle on your way home) that you loved them even more the closer to crap they got.
Well, until the rather disappointing final two albums... but I was already ready to forgive them anything by then.
I'll miss them and so should you.
If you go here you'll find an mp3 of their last ever studio song, played at the BBC studios in Maida Vale (this link courtesy of the increasingly excellent Empty Free
Puremusic.Net has Orbital's Belfast along with other dance 'classics' like Future Sound of London's Papua New Guinea and some others that are vastly inferior.
Orbital - Lush 3-1 from the 'brown' album
Orbital - Dwr Budr from Insides
Orbital - Dr Who from the slightly disappointing The Altogether
Orbital - Sad but true from the underrated Snivilisation
3 comments:
Orbital r one of those bands I used to love at The Orbit when living in Leeds, they were a revelation, and leaders when the whole movement of dance music was cutting edge and still relevant.
Over the years they innovated, re-invented and clichéd the way through the monotonous dance music culture, bringing excitement, fun and innovation to the genre. Never stale, always exciting – I will always remember the first time I danced to Satan live, and them rescuing me from a bad trip at Glastonbury by playing something that sounded like LFO with Heaven is a Place on Earth one year.
The next year, they were still visiting, same time, same place, and we managed to head bang to the front as the used a very inappropriate Bon-Jovi sample.
The E.P. Style saw them drawing away in many neu directions you always new they loved ( from the glam rock of Bagpipe Style, too krautrock and even electro style) , and I sort of dreamed they could grow into something else, in the same way Sonic Youth grew from being an ‘alternative rock band’.
This is basically a love song to two brothers with a great sense of rhythm, humour and anarchy, who knew when to be cool, and when not too be.
Love you, miss you more than I can say in words, but respect exactly why THIS IS THE END>.
Orbital r one of those bands I used to love at The Orbit when living in Leeds, they were a revelation, and leaders when the whole movement of dance music was cutting edge and still relevant.
Over the years they innovated, re-invented and clichéd the way through the monotonous dance music culture, bringing excitement, fun and innovation to the genre. Never stale, always exciting – I will always remember the first time I danced to Satan live, and them rescuing me from a bad trip at Glastonbury by playing something that sounded like LFO with Heaven is a Place on Earth one year.
The next year, they were still visiting, same time, same place, and we managed to head bang to the front as the used a very inappropriate Bon-Jovi sample.
The E.P. Style saw them drawing away in many neu directions you always new they loved ( from the glam rock of Bagpipe Style, too krautrock and even electro style) , and I sort of dreamed they could grow into something else, in the same way Sonic Youth grew from being an ‘alternative rock band’.
This is basically a love song to two brothers with a great sense of rhythm, humour and anarchy, who knew when to be cool, and when not too be.
Love you, miss you more than I can say in words, but respect exactly why THIS IS THE END>.
I can't believe both you and Mr Jazzfunk got all that way without mentioning the little torchy specs.....
(guys at gussetblog tell me you can buy 'em on ebay now)
Post a Comment