This is a fascinating overview of music's intriguing and enduring relationship with the dark side. Much of the music discussed in Gathering Of The Tribe deals with the special power of sound and tone. Frank Zappa may have said that ‘writing about music is like dancing about architecture,’ but this book explains how music can - or for a moment believed it could - move mountains. It is a matter of record that over the centuries composers and musicians have been consistently inspired by the...

This collection of essays highlights innovative work in the developing field of media archaeology. It explores the relationship between theory and practice and the relationship between media archaeology and other disciplines. There are three sections to the collection proposing new possible fields of research for media studies: Media Archaeological Theory; Experimental Media Archaeology; Media Archaeology at the Interface. The book includes essays from acknowledged experts in this expandin...

él records was created in 1984 by Mike Alway. Alway was A&R man for Cherry Red signing artists such as Everything But the Girl, Monochrome Set, Felt etc. He left Cherry Red to help run Blanco Y Negro but soon felt constrained about the conservativism of the commercial music sector and left to set up his own label. él was described as »the most innately English record label there has ever been«. Alway's mercurial approach was to take complete control of the repertoire, the philosophy of the...

The writer, musician and curator Tot Taylor observed that the word ‘ritual’ is already present in the word ‘spiritual’. This combination of material practice and the transcendent can be found within the strange combination of records discussed in this volume. With music, one can transpose imagination, visions and dreams into ‘sacred rites’. ‘Heavy conscious creation’, the theme of this series, embodies the realisation of occult and esoteric ideas through artistic expression, in this case s...

It is clear that landscapes have long inspired the consciousness of creative artists. By way of quick introduction to the links between music and territories, the 1977 KPM 1191 library music LP features a suite of pieces with titles such as ‘Country Lanes’, ‘Passing Meadows’ and ‘Memory Lane’ composed by Johnny Pearson to express the different aspects of (mostly rural) landscapes. The pieces are interesting as they try to capture an immersive experience of being in a land by using sound. T...

The records discussed in GATHERING OF THE TRIBE: ACID explore the key aspects of the acid experience, these being principally the way in which psychedelic drugs intensify sensory impressions (sound and vision); the ability to experience different dimensions simultaneously and mystical dimensions where the individual feels unified with the cosmos. This music also explores aspects of the infamous ‘bad trip’ or the ‘terror that was wrong’, where positive feelings are replaced by paranoia, dep...

“The Mondo Cane films were an important key to what was going on in the media landscape of the 1960s, especially post the JFK assassination. Nothing was true, and nothing was untrue…” J G Ballard   Being the first ever English-language title devoted exclusively to the controversial and influential mondo documentary film cycle, this revised edition of Sweet and Savage remains the only serious study of mondo as a global film phenomenon, and includes a detailed examination of the key films of...

David Toop's extraordinary work of sonic history travels from the rainforests of Amazonas to the megalopolis of Tokyo via the work of artists as diverse as Brian Eno, Sun Ra, Erik Satie, Kate Bush, Kraftwerk and Brian Wilson.Beginning in 1889 at the Paris exposition when Debussy first heard Javanese music performed, Ocean of Sound channels the competing instincts of 20th century music into an exhilarating, path-breaking account of ambient sound.'A meditatio...

Great Minds Don't Think Alike surveys some of the most brilliant minds of the past and present. Discover the methods and rituals they used to forge a constructive, creative pathway, from the downright peculiar to the reassuringly pedestrian.Learn the importance of daily routines with Sylvia Plath, embrace randomness with David Bowie and transcend tragedy with Frida Kahlo.With 56 tried and tested creative techniques from inspired, and inspiring, min...

Film music is as old as cinema itself. Years before synchronized sound became the norm, projected moving images were shown to musical accompaniment, whether performed by a lone piano player or a hundred-piece orchestra. Today film music has become its own industry, indispensable to the marketability of movies around the world. Film Music: A Very Short Introduction is a compact, lucid, and thoroughly engaging overview written by one of the leading authorities on the subject. After ...

Pocket Essentials is a dynamic series of books that are concise, lively, and easy to read. Packed with facts as well as expert opinions, each book has all the key information you need to know about such popular topics as film, television, cult fiction, history, and more. Classical purists say it isn't "real" music, yet it regularly tops charts and plays to sell-out concert hall audiences. This book looks at such topics as who have been the most influential composers, which scores have best...

In these writings, available here in English for the first time, the distinguished Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu reflects on his contemporaries, including John Cage, Olivier Messiaen, and Merce Cunningham; on nature, which has profoundly influenced his composition; on film and painting; on relationships between East and West; on traditional Japanese music; and on his own compositions.