This article needs quite a bit of tidying up, but because it’s already late I’ve decided to publish what I have now and refine it in the future, many thanks!
March 2024 heralds the 30th anniversary of Selected Ambient Works Volume II. Released in 1994, Richard’s second album under Aphex Twin , constitutes an extensive yet varied collection of ambient music spread across two compact discs or three LPs.
“Chilling out for me is getting monged out of your head, sitting somewhere totally wasted basically. ‘Ambient Works 2’ is the stuff I prefer to listen to. I just get more into tracks like that.”
Mixmag (May 1995)
Unlike the first volume of Selected Ambient Works ’85-’92, Volume Two is more closely aligned with the traditional format of ambient electronic music associated with musicians such as Brian Eno, Terry Riley and Steve Reich. The words ambient music in this context loosely seems to mean that traditional musical concepts such as tempo, pitch, melody and percussion are all secondary considerations to texture, mood and other atmospheric components. The aforementioned musical concepts are used purely in the service of generating a unique atmosphere, often provoking meditative or subconscious thoughts within the listener.
Prior to the release of Volume Two there were a couple of previously released tracks that hinted at the creative pathway that Richard would eventually take. The first track that fits this mould is ‘i’ from Selected Ambient Works ’85-’92, the oldest track from that album, which was apparently created when Richard was only 13 years old. In contrast to the rest of the album ‘i’ features no percussion or song structure and features a single ethereal reverb heavy synth pad evolving and modulating for the duration of the track.
“the new album is totally different…there’s hardly any beats on it at all.”
B-Side Magazine (April/May 1994)
Richard attributes this lack of percussion on Volume II, to the manner in which it was created, i.e. his use of the technique known as lucid dreaming which is discussed in further depth later on in this article:
This manner of working immediately explains why there are so few rhythms to be heard on the two-and-a-half-hour-long Selected Ambient Works Volume 2. The hip techno generation might have a hard time with it, but that’s of little concern to our Richard. “For some reason, I never use percussion in my dreams. When I work in the usual way, I can decide whether to use a beat or not. But in my dreams, I don’t have control over that.”
OOR Magazine (March 1994)
| Track Title | Length |
| Cliffs | 7:27 |
| Radiator aka harmonicom | 6:34 |
| Rhubarb | 7:44 |
| Hankie * | 4:39 |
| Grass | 8:55 |
| Mould | 3:31 |
| Curtains | 8:51 |
| Blur | 5:08 |
| Weathered Stone | 6:54 |
| Tree | 9:58 |
| Domino aka modal 10 | 7:18 |
| White Blur 1 | 2:42 |
| Blue Calx | 7:20 |
| Parallel Stripes | 8:00 |
| Shiny Metal Rods | 5:33 |
| Grey Stripe | 4:45 |
| Z Twig | 2:05 |
| Windowsill | 7:16 |
| Stone in Focus † | 10:11 |
| Hexagon | 5:57 |
| Lichen | 4:15 |
| Spots | 7:09 |
| Tassels | 7:30 |
| White Blur 2 | 11:27 |
| Matchsticks | 5:41 |
| th1 [evnslower] ‡ | 11:07 |
Ambient Influences
When the subject of musical influence is broached by the media, Richard, as usual, disavows the usual suspects when it comes to any overt or explicit influences that may have shaped the music found in Volume II. John Cage, Stockhausen, Reich, Riley and Eno are all name checked by the press, yet Richard tells us that he hadn’t heard of Eno’s music prior to creating his own Records.
This might seem a bit far fetched as Eno’s music was almost ubiquitously heard at one time or another, via radio, television and film. However if you take into account that Richard was growing up in a rural/provincial setting in the 1970s when only three channels were broadcast on British television and information about your own personal interests was only derived from a fortunate happenstance or a trip to the library; then Richard denying his unfamiliarity with the music of Brian Eno doesn’t seem so far fetched.
Having said this I wouldn’t be surprised if Richard had unwittingly heard the music of the artists mentioned previous, perhaps as the soundtrack to an obscure documentary or the background music in an Open University program. In a quote given to NME in 1995 (found below) Richard out rightly makes the comparison between Selected Ambient Works Volume II and the music of Brian Eno, suggesting its is a modified or derivative form of Eno’s ambient creations, although he denies he had heard of his Brian’s music prior to recording Volume II.
Whenever ambient pioneer Brian Eno talks about the post-house revolution neo-ambient, he comes up with Aphex Twin. No wonder, after two volumes of Selected ambient Works. James, in turn, is deeply irritated by that term. “It means so many different things by now. For me it’s about music without beats. The fact that you do hear beats on the first Selected Ambient Works is because it was put together by my friends. But yes, music without beats has also been made for thousands of years, so there is actually nothing shocking going on. I was making that kind of music long before I heard an Eno and all that shit.’
OOR Magazine (30th November 1996)
This week the Aphex Twin releases Selected Ambient Works Volume II (Warp). Packaged as a triple album or a two-CD set, this is a denser, less easily accessible effort than Volume I, more in keeping with traditional notions of ambience. It comes as no surprise to find that James has spent the last year listening to Stockhausen, whom he hadn’t previously heard (“I like it, it’s totally mad,” he grins). What distinguishes this record from the experiments of the past is that, in keeping with the output of other moderns such as Biosphere, Main, Seefeel and Underworld, it contains a dark edge, an existential quality that lifts it above the level of mere avant-garde techno-doodling.
The Guardian (9th March 1994)
In fact, it’s only quite recently that James has retraced the history of avant-classical music and left-field rock, listening to Cage, Stockhausen, Reich, Riley, Eno, Can et al.
“All that stuff, it’s f***ing excellent. Riley’s ‘In C’ is great. I really like…what do they call it? Minimalism. ‘Selected Ambient Works Volume 2′ is full of the simplest pieces I could make.”
Melody Maker (27th November 1993)
At this point, he first encountered music that remains important to him to this day. “Kraftwerk’s weirder stuff, Wendy Carlos, Terry Riley, Steve Reich. I probably like Steve Reich best. But this is music I enjoy. Not influences. I hate the idea of being influenced. The thought of putting bits of other people’s music into my own makes me sick.
Q Magazine (March 1994)
“I suppose my ambient stuff is just a modified version of Brian Eno. The difference is, I never heard any Brian Eno before I started making records.”
NME (18th March 1995)
Ever listen to 70s ‘electronic’ artists like Brian Eno or Kraftwerk?
“I didn’t really listen to anything.”
Mixmag (August 1993)
“I buy about £200 worth of records a week. At the moment it’s mostly ’70s electronic stuff like Can – I’ve just got Popol Vuh’s last album”
Music Technology Magazine (July 1993)
RL: “You’ve said too that you were recording what you call or what people call ambient music before you had even heard of Brian Eno or even maybe ambient music as a whole genre. Have you gone back and listened to any of this stuff now? I mean especially some of the earlier…what he, I guess coined the term ambient. I’m thinking about records like Music for Airports or On Land, do you ever listen to any of that stuff?”
Aphex: “Not any more. I did when people said my stuff sounded like it, I went out and listened to it, (out of interest). I do like it, I don’t really listen to it now, but I do like it.”
Request Line (January, 1997)
Composition
The music that would go on to form Volume II was recorded during a transitional period of Richard’s life, i.e. his leaving of his Cornish home town Lanner and his resettlement in London, where he would embark on his degree in microelectronics from Kingston Polytechnic.
“When I’m in Cornwall I work on sounds there. I usually put them on DAT and take them with me to London. Here I sample them and create my tracks. Sometimes I also bring my sequencer here and build a track that I then fill in with sounds in Cornwall. So I travel up and down a lot. I think it’s fine this way, because all my friends still live there. And then I work and play there some more, so that I can make the trip pay.”
Disco Dance Magazine Interview (1993)
Richard now has three studios full of weird instruments, one in Cornwall and for some time two in London. The studio in Cornwall is the Machinery Cabinet of Curiosities, where the foundation is laid for new material. The more regular synthesizers and drum machines are located in London, although these machines have also been tinkered with. Here the raw Cornwall ideas are further developed and prepared for release.
Bassic Groove (issue 10, 1993)
The track that perhaps defines this transitional period is Blue Calx which was apparently the last track ever recorded at Richard’s home studio of Lannerlog. Released on The Philosophy of Sound And Machine’ compilation in October of 1992, the initial release of Blue Calx preceded the rest of Selected Ambient Works volume II by over a year.
“Recorded in Linmiri [Lannerlog bedroom studio], probably the last track I ever recorded in that house, quite fitting really, end of that era.”
Richard discussing the creation of the track Blue Calx on his webstore around 2017
A contemporaneous quote found from January of 1994 tells us specifically that the album was recorded between Cornwall and London and at that point was completely finished almost a year prior to its eventual release. In November of 2014 during a promotional interview for his newly released album Syro, Richard mentions that approximately half of Selected Ambient Works Volume II was created in London and identifies 36 Clissold Crescent as the place where this took place. From this information we can also say with some certainty that the other half of the album was produced in Lannerlog, presumably around the same time as Blue Calx .
“I made ICBYD, RDJ, half of SAW2 etc etc there, amazing good times”
Richard talking about his time at 36 Clissold Crescent, Syrobonkers interview (November 2014)
I think Richard possibly mixed up the location of the albums London recordings, as he was living at a flat in Southgate Road in Dalston from the summer of 1992 until late in 1993. Presumably the entire album had been created before he moved into Clissold Crescent as we are told in a couple of quotes below that the material that constitutes Volume II was already over a year old by the time of its release.
“We shared a flat at 184 Southgate Road until late summer”
Paul Nicholson speaking to the Lanner Chronicle about the above photograph (28/11/2022)
The following quotes from Melody Maker and NME respectively, reinforce the idea that Volume II was created during this transitional time period which is surprising given the cohesive quality the album undoubtedly has. We are told in January 1994 by Richard that Volume II was completed over a year ago which suggests that by the end of 1992, remarkably everything on the record was already recorded:
“The new album was recorded at Aphex Twin’s home studios in London and Cornwall, and was completed almost a year ago.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
he claims that we can look forward to hearing an Aphex Twin track that wasn’t recorded before his first ever release. That’ll change in February 1994 when his eagerly awaited ‘Ambient Works 2’ is released.
“But even that’s over a year old,” he snorts
NME, (January 8th 1994)
There is compelling evidence that late 1992 was indeed the time period in which Volume II was composed and recorded. Aside from Blue Calx being released in October of that year February of 1993 saw the release of Analogue Bubblebath Volume 3 which contained a track that was almost certainly an outtake from the sessions that produced Selected Ambient Works Volume II. Presumably this track was recorded sometime towards the end of 1992:
I’ve read that you have this vault with all these hundreds of hours worth of songs, did any of Ambient 2 come from the vault or is most of it new material?
“It is fairly recent, I mean I finished the album a year before it was released and the stuff that did go back was only written a year from there so the oldest tracks are only two years old.”
Movement Zine (1994)
Microtonal Music
“Microtones are pitches that create intervals smaller than a half-step. The use of microtones is more than a recent occurrence; ancient Greek theorists wrote about them and experimented with them. Composers today are probably more aware of microtonal possibilities than any time in the past three hundred years.”
Theoretical foundations of music by William Duckworth (1978)
One of the most prevalent techniques employed by Richard in the creation of Selected Ambient Works Volume II is that of microtonality; i.e. tuning the notes on his synthesisers to specific frequencies that are usually a fraction of those found on a traditional western instrument.
A traditional piano for instance is tuned to the equal temperament system where an octave of notes is divided between 12 intervals comprised of whole tones or semi tones. Microtonal tuning however allows for many more intervals within an octave incorporating quarter tones, third tones and other such fractions. A microtonal tuning system might be entirely different than that of equal temperament and not based on the frequencies found in that system at all.
In the two quotes below Richard explains how he utilised his own custom tunings during the composition of Selected Ambient Works Volume II, in an effort to create something that sounded truly different.
“1/4 tone, 1/8 tone i used quite a bit on SAW2 well my versions of them, tweaked”
Syrobonkers interview (November 2014)
“The new album is radically different to the first ‘Ambient Works’,” he told The Maker. “Most of the tracks are a lot more minimal, and only three or four of them have rhythms. A lot of the tracks are based on my own tunings and scales. There’s an infinite number of notes between C and C sharp, but most musicians in the West never use them. With special micro-tuning, I’ve been able to give the tracks a completely different edge.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
This wasn’t the first or last time Richard used micro tuning on one of his records. On his user18081971 SoundCloud account he specified that the track .215061 from Analogue Bubblebath Volume 3 was one of his earliest attempts in using the technique of micro tonal tuning.
“Think was one of the first tracks that a small section with intentional microtuning”
User18081971 SoundCloud account (2021)
The upshot of all this is that Selected Ambient Works Volume II has a strange often unnerving and mystical quality on several of its tracks which can be attributed to the timbral quality of the sounds chosen; but also the unusual frequencies of the notes within the melodies that produce an atmosphere unique to this particular record.
In 2015 during his ongoing SoundCloud dump of unreleased material, Richard uploaded a couple of tracks from Volume II with alternative titles (see tracklisting further up on this article), presumably the original titles of these tracks. Along with these specific uploads were a few images of geometric artworks from the website of Barbara Hero, a visual artist and musical theorist who created her own microtonal tuning systems based on the mathematics of Pythagoras; as well as several other tuning systems where frequencies were mapped to corresponding tables of variables based on colours, minerals, Hindu cosmological constants, isotope ratios and the Mayan Calendar.
It’s reasonable to assume Richard was aware of Barbara before the creation of Selected Ambient Works Volume II and therefore she was just as influential to Richard; if not more so, at this time period as people such as Brian Eno and Terry Riley who were mentioned previously.
Timbral Selection
A second vital consideration in the creation of Volume II, alongside the decision to utilise micro tuning, was what timbres or textures Richard would apply to the tracks. In the following quotes we learn that the sounds on Volume II were deliberately deconstructed to their purest elements to engender a feeling within the listener of being subsumed by a monolithic soundscape.
Furthermore Richard discusses the idea of everyday prosaic sounds, those our brain tends to filter out automatically as we go about our daily lives. His example is the hustle and bustle of a supermarket which in and of itself is unremarkable, yet when these sounds are sampled and integrated into the background of an ambient track, the effect it has on mood and atmospherics can be substantial. There are several tracks on Volume II where snippets of incoherent dialogue and ordinary commonplace sounds are incorporated into a new musical context.
“I also set myself the challenges of recording some of the tracks using one sound, and one sound only. That way, I’ve been able to get down to ultra-pure frequencies and sine waves. When a sound is broken down into the most basic, elementary parts like that, you reach a point where it seems to be coming from all around you rather than just coming straight out of the speaker. It surrounds the whole room and means that you’re able to feel as well as hear the music.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
The key to Richard James’ music, whatever name he’s using at the time, is his fascination for the textures of sounds. He doesn’t so much make tracks but sculptures. It’s as if the melodies and beats have a physical presence. “That’s exactly it!” he beams. “I mean, some of the tracks I’ve recorded for ‘Ambient Works 2’ consist of just one sound. I’m trying to make music which surrounds you, which fills the room. I love the idea of the record ending and leaving a huge gap in your head. It’s a shame people don’t really listen to what goes on around them. Everyday sounds, like the sounds in a supermarket, are blanked out, because you’ve heard them so many times before. But if you take a microphone to the supermarket, as I often do, and play the tape back at home, I’ts f***ing brilliant.”
Melody Maker Interview (June 1993)
“In daily life you get used to blanking out sounds, you get out of the habit of listening, and only listen when you sit down and make the decision to turn your tape deck on. Like, when you turn it off, you stop listening. It’s difficult to be alert to sounds all the time. When I’ve got the DAT in a supermarket, I’m not thinking ‘this ambience sounds really wild’, but when I get home and listen back to it, especially if it’s underneath a track, it sounds great. Even my mum will say it sounds good. It’s just impressive. And when she’s in the supermarket, she’s not impressed by it at all. That’s strange. It’s to do with placing it in a different context.”
Music Technology Magazine (July 1993)
Deliberate Insomnia
In the run-up to the release of Volume II Richard mentioned several times in the music press that he deliberately invoked a state of sleep deprivation in an effort to create more free time to compose music. at the tail end of 1993 he explains to Melody Maker that he regards the time we spend asleep as a lost opportunity, a time that could theoretically be reclaimed and put towards some productive endeavour.
Richard claims that he has managed to whittle down the time he spends asleep from four hours to only two. Plausibly you might be able to get away with this sort of thing for a few days at most but I’m fairly certain that even Richard would find the basic laws of human biology unescapable…
“When I was little, I decided sleep was a waste of your life. If you lived to be 100, but you didn’t sleep, it’d be like living to 200. But, originally, it wasn’t for more time to make music, it was just that I thought sleep was a bit of a con. I’d always been able to get away with four hours a night, but tried to narrow it down to two. And you do get used to it. I reckon It’d take you three weeks to whittle down from eight hours to two. You should try it, it’s wicked.”
Melody Maker (27th November 1993)
Again in January of 1994, this time in the NME Richard tells us that he only sleeps for two hours night at maximum. Interestingly he also makes the admission that he derives no personal enjoyment from making music, it sees it purely as a means to an end, perhaps how your typical office worker would feel about their own occupation:
“I don’t take any pleasure out of the work I do, if I could stop tomorrow I would,” he repeats. “sometimes I think that if I had a 16 hour-a-day job I’d get more time to make tracks than I do now. That’s why I don’t sleep for more than two hours a night if possible, so that I do all the crap I’ve got to do for the biz during normal hours but when everyone else goes to sleep I go into my studio.”
NME, (January 8th 1994)
The next quote, this time from Hypno Magazine elaborates a bit more on this unusual sleeping arrangement. It’s claimed Richard spent a month sleeping only half an hour each day with weekends set asides for a longer sleeping session which would give rise to R.E.M sleep (rapid eye movement). A mode of sleeping involved in the generation of dreams.
In terms of locale, the studio is not an unusual place for Richard to sleep because he spends most all his time there. It’s really just unusual for him to take the time to sleep. He’s been avoiding it since was 12 years old – he’s 22 now. “From quite an early age, I decided sleep was a waste of time. I tried to get away with as little as possible.” Richard says without a yawn. While composing the tracks on Ambient II, a 23-track double LP where every track is identifiable only by time and textures, he went four weeks sleeping only a half hour each day with a three hour R.E.M marathon on the weekends. “I’ve really grown accustomed to it now,” he says. “It’s just a time thing.”
Hypno Magazine (Vol 3, 1994)
Here is a brief explanation of the subject matter for those unfamiliar with the term R.E.M sleep:
“The sleeper tosses and turns as though awake. The eyes dart back and forth rapidly under closed eyelids. The heart rate increases, and blood pressure fluctuates wildly. There is convulsive movement of the very small muscles in the face and fingers, but the arms and legs are effectively paralysed during REM sleep. The reason for this paralysis is not known, although some experts have theorised that it occurs as a protection against physically reacting to dreams – for it is during REM sleep that most dreaming occurs. People dreaming about fighting and flailing their arms and legs about wildly might easily get hurt; the paralysis prevents that, and the reaction to the active dreams looks to an observer more like tics and twitches.”
“Sleep researchers say that when they awaken subjects during REM sleep, approximately 80 percent can recall their dreams, while only 7 percent of those awakened during non-REM sleep say that they were dreaming. The dreams of REM sleep have a very different character than those of non-REM sleep. “They tend to be more vivid and visual,” explains one expert, “more emotional and sometimes frightening, and they usually have a continuous, detailed, and often bizarre story content. Dreams reported after non-REM sleep are usually disjointed and fragmentary,”
Excerpt taken from Sleep Disorders by Gail B. Stewart (2003)
The theme of sleep deprivation continues in this quote for Melody Maker, published March of 1994, the month of release for Volume II. Richard describes that at this point the amount of sleep he gets has increased slightly although it still seems wildly inadequate amount (well if we take Richard at his word!). We are told that after spending time with his friends to the early hours of the morning that rather go off to bed, that is the point in which he retires to his studio to make music:
“I don’t mind this because I never make music during social hours, I always do it during early hours,” he says. “I still don’t sleep much [The Aphex Twin has in the past claimed only to sleep for two or three hours a night], though I do sleep more that I used to – now, I have to stick to f***ing schedules. It’s quite sorted. Most people flake out about three or four o’ clock, when you’re with mates. And that’s it, they go off to bed and I go off to the studio.”
Melody Maker (12th March 1994)
By this stage word of Richard’s lack of rest has obviously proliferated amongst the British music press as he is asked bluntly if he is an insomniac by the NME:
IS IT TRUE YOU’RE AN INSOMNIAC?
“No. I don’t sleep out of choice”
NME (17th April 1994)
In the following two quotes we see that this lack of sleep is having a deleterious effect on Richard’s everyday circumstances. This particular amusing example being the effect of falling asleep by the simple act of walking across the room after many hours of strenuously concentrating on finishing the track he was currently making:
Does he ever nod off halfway through a track leaving the tape running? “I never fall asleep making music. I can stay awake indefinitely making music as long as it’s necessary to finish something off. As soon as I take my mind off music I instantly fall asleep.”
“If I’ve been up for three days and haven’t slept, the minute I look away from making music and go to make a cup of tea, I can fall asleep walking across the room. Your mind goes totally out the window. It’s quite mental, I really enjoy it.”
Generator Magazine (April 1994)
“I’m quite crafty at staying awake. When I’m making tracks or listening to music I can stay awake indefinitely, as long as I’m actually making tracks. As soon as I turn my back on it, I fall asleep. I’ll be doing a track and I’ll get up to make some tea or something, but as soon as I get up I’ll fall asleep, as I’m getting up, which is really strange, I just hit the floor, Or you might just stay where you are, and you get up in some really weird position.”
XLR8R Magazine (issue 11,1994)
In a quote from a year later, this time from the NME Richard is directly challenged on the authenticity of his claims about his sleeping patters. Richard denies that he concocted these stories in the press to perhaps generate buzz surrounding his mercurial nature. Personally I believe the truth as ever with most of Richard’s claims lies somewhere in the middle of his fantastic claims. There always seems to be an element of truth to them although I suspected they often exaggerated for effect. With the music press often asking either nonsensical or irrelevant questions; it seems apt that Richard often takes the piss or replies with deliberately opaque answers.:
ALL THAT STUFF ABOUT YOU NEVER GOING TO SLEEP IS JUST BOLLOCKS, ISN’T IT?
“WELL, I go through phases. Sometimes I sleep, sometimes I don’t. For a while I only ever got about three hours of sleep a week. Then that fizzled out to about two hour a night and now I’m pretty normal I think.”
“It’s really difficult to go a week without sleep. I need to be doing the music ‘cos that’s the only think that keeps me awake. If you go over four days, it gets really trippy and you start losing it. You can’t think properly. But you sort of get through that and then it’s just like being stoned. It’s alright once you get used to it. If people don’t believe me…sorted.”
NME (18th March 1995)
Dream Studio
Directly related to the previous section of this article is the subject matter of lucid dreaming, the act of lucid dream is an attempt by a person to create a set of condition which enables them to become aware of the fact they are dreaming. In some sense they become conscious whist inside their own dream and can guide and direct the dream to indulge in personal fantasies and other flights of fancies.
One of the myths about him, which I believe, is that he could lucid dream music- a total connection to creativity. The white heat. He conjured all hues of Heaven and Hell, with an infinite sonic palette.
Richard’s former housemate, artist and illustrator Michelle Gillette (2015)
“I’ve been able to do it since I was little,” Richard explains. “I (taught?) myself how to do it and it’s my most precious thing. Through the years, I’ve done everything that you can do, including talking and shagging with anyone you feel that takes your fancy. The only thing I haven’t done is try to kill myself. That’s a bit shady. You probably wouldn’t wake up, and you wouldn’t know if it had worked, anyway. Or maybe you would.”
“I often throw myself off skyscrapers or cliffs and zoom off right at the last minute. That’s quite good fun. It’s well realistic. Eating food is quite smart. Like tasting food. Smells as well. I make food up and sometimes they don’t taste of anything – like they taste of some weird mishmash of other things.”
The Face Magazine (March 1994)
The obvious question is how lucid dreaming relates to deliberate insomnia, the answer might lie in the attempt by the insomniac to approach the state of R.E.M sleep quicker whilst maintain some level of mental awareness as they approach sleep. In interviews from this time period Richard explains that he exploits the reproducible effects of lucid dreaming by conjuring up a psychic representation of his own music studio and at other times a completely illusory studio filled with imaginary equipment.
It is in this dream state that the majority of the music for Volume II was composed. Richard states that whilst sleeping for relatively short periods of time, he is able to utilise the fantastical resources and mechanisms of his own subconscious for the purposes of creating music:
Some of the tracks were recorded under the influence of what Aphex Twin, Richard James, calls “lucid dreaming”.
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
Richard James also has a penchant for altered states of all kinds. He openly provides information about his working principle, his view of altering reality synthetically. Primarily, he wants to shut down the knowledgeable musician within himself to trip innocently. He particularly values the “hypnagogic” or “hypnopompic” state, the former being a semi-conscious state full of dreams, the latter being that early morning mood when one is not fully present.
Spex Magazine (February 1994)
“This is going to sound really weird but…well, I’m a lucid dreamer, you see. I can control my dreams. I make tracks in my dreams. Sometimes I’m in my own studio and sometimes in an imaginary studio and sometimes my real studio but with imaginary equipment. It used to be a real struggle to remember the tunes when I woke up. But I’m training myself to do it. I reckon I get about 70 per cent of my stuff that way now.”
“It’s a mad idea but it works. I mean, it’s like telling someone else your dream. It doesn’t always come out quite as you remember it but I can get melodies very clearly that way now. I’ve thought about really analysing where it all comes from, plotting charts and graphs and so on, but I’m afraid I’ll find out something I don’t want to know.”
Q Magazine (March 1994)
Rather than a direct representation of the music generated within his dreams, the music we hear on the actual album is an imperfect facsimile of what he originally heard whilst asleep. When it comes to the melodic content of the music, Richard assures us that this is the element that is most easily reproduced in the real world after he has reawakened.
When it comes to the actual timbre or textural quality of the music from his dream state, he can only produce an approximation of what it was actually like. As an analogy, I imagine this is the equivalent of explaining to someone the content of your own dreams; words are often insufficient to describe the eccentric nature of what you have just experienced.
To further illustrate this point Richard tells us in the following quotation that his imaginary dream equipment can manifest as literally anything, you want a banana that sounds like a synthesiser? You’ve got it!
He imagines sounds using imaginary equipment, in an imaginary studio or his own, and uses these sounds as the basis for his tracks.
What sort of imaginary gear do you work on?
Whoa (pause) It’s really hard to explain, actually. Basically, the easiest way to say it is gear that does anything.
What does it look like?
Anything.
Vegetables?
If you’d like, I’ve only been doing it for two years, I’ve never tried anything like that, but I guess if you want a machine that looks like a banana the you’ve got one….
Does the way they look correspond to the way they sound?
Sometimes, it depends on how much control you’re in as well. That changes quite a lot. It’s really boring when I’m in total control, it’s just like when I’m awake.
XLR8R Magazine (issue 11,1994)
Below are a whole host of quotes concerning Richard’s experience with lucid dreaming. There is some overlapping content but I’ve decided to keep them all here for the historical record.
“I did all that with lucid dreaming,” Richard says during a phone conversation from his parent’s house in Cornwall, England. Lucid dreaming is an actual psychological phenomena which involves sleeping for short amounts of time and channelling your dreams to work for you. “Very simply. it involves me falling asleep for no more than about 40 minutes, dreaming I’m in the studio with an imaginary equipment list kind of thing. I basically dream tracks. The tracks can be like almost instantaneous depending on what kind of dream it is. I wake myself up, and, because I always sleep in the studio, just try and create the tracks as best I can in the real world. I can usually wake up and remember the tunes almost exactly, but the sounds are never…I can never get them the same, although I’m getting closer and closer.”
Hypno Magazine (Vol 3, 1994)
“Some of the tracks were recorded under the influence of lucid dreaming. In other words, they’re based on sounds I first heard while dreaming. When I wake up, I go straight into the studio and try to recreate what I’ve heard in my dreams.”
“I’ve been able to control my dreams since I was a kid, and just before I started work on the album I tried experimenting with the idea of dreaming about recording tracks. As the album progressed I found that I was able to train myself to do it pretty much whenever I wanted to.”
“The main problem is remembering what I’ve dreamt about. Melodies are easy, but the actual sounds can be a little more difficult. Sometimes I sleep in the studio so that I can start work as soon as I wake up and there’s less chance of forgetting anything.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
Broaching this subject of dreams, he becomes animated and talks a long streak. “This album is really specific,” he says, “because 70 per cent of it is done from lucid dreaming.” To have lucid dreams is to be conscious of being in a dream state, even to be capable of directing the action while still in a dream.
The Face Magazine ( March 1994)
“About a year and a half ago,” he says, “I badly wanted to dream tracks. Like imagine I’m in the studio and write a track in my sleep, wake up and then write it in the real world with real instruments. I couldn’t do it at first. The main problem was just remembering it. Melodies were easy to remember. I’d go to sleep in my studio. I’d got to sleep for ten minutes and write three tracks – only small segments, not 100 per cent finished tracks. I’d wake up and I’d only been asleep for ten minutes. That’s quite mental.
I vary the way I do it, dreaming either I’m in my studio, entirely the way it is, or all kinds of variations. The hardest thing is getting the sounds the same. It’s never the same. It doesn’t really come close to it. When you have a nightmare or a weird dream, you wake up and tell someone about it and it sounds really shit. It’s the same for sounds, roughly. When I imagine sounds, they are in dream form. As you get better at doing it, you can get closer and closer to the actual sounds. But that’s only 70 per cent of it.”
The Face Magazine (March 1994)
Most of Selected Ambient Works Volume II was made, he maintains, using a technique described as “lucid dreaming”. This allegedly involved quite literally – dreaming up tunes.
“The thing is, ” he says, “I’ve only ever taken about four hours sleep a night and sometimes in my studio I’ll go for several days without any proper sleep. When I’m really tired like that, I find that I can go to sleep for an hour or so and when I wake up, there’s a piece of music in my head. Then the idea is to get it down on tape as quickly as possible, The tunes are no problem, but I still have trouble recreating the sounds. It’s a bit like when you have a nightmare and then you wake up and try to describe it to someone. It never sounds the same. That’s how it is with music. But the source is there somewhere in what you’ve made.”
Listening to the results, this sounds less far-fetched than it otherwise might.
The Guardian (9th March 1994)
“I’ve always had sounds in my dreams and that’s where stuff from the album came from. I couldn’t do it a first. I’d sleep for 20 minutes, dream a track, wake up and then forget it. Be pissed off. Do it again. And finally get it right. It’s something I’ve only just started doing. My most successful thing is to go to sleep in the studio, then dream I’m in the studio along real or imaginary bits of gear, do the track in my dream, then wake up and recreate the whole thing. I was so amazed when it actually worked. In about two years time I reckon I’ll have the whole thing completely sorted.”
Melody Maker (12th March 1994)
“The album is mostly made up from lucid dreaming which is a mental process I discovered about two years ago, and use about 60% of the time. The whole concept is totally bizarre. I’ve been able to control my dreams since I was really little and I’ve always had sounds in my dreams.”
“For the past two years I’ve been writing tracks in my sleep and then trying to recreate them when I wake up. It didn’t work at first because I kept forgetting them in the same way that you forget normal dreams, but with practice I’ve managed to remember them.”
“A typical scenario is that I can fall asleep for half an hour and write a track that would’ve taken me half a day and then wake up and do it. It’s in dream form so I can get the melodies if there’s melodies there, but the sounds you can never recreate. It’s like if you have a dream and try to explain it to someone, it seems really weird to you but it comes out really shit because you can’t describe it in words.”
Generator Magazine (April 1994)
Most of his current album, Selected Ambient Works Vol. 2, is the result of nocturnal explorations. The spacey tracks are his most ambient yet, almost completely shinning rhythm and melody for minimal pure sound. Unnerving and unique, the music inhabits a universe entirely of James’ creation.
Although bewildered by the process, he insists the majority of the tracks (represented on the double-CD sleeve not by words but by abstract images of textures) were created during dreams with vivid sounds and cerebral recording equipment. “I dream about anything. It’s something that I love doing. I don’t need much time to do it. I can fall asleep for 20 minutes or half an hour, which suits me. I can dream up any dream I want to. I’ve always had sounds in my dreams. I’ve always been able to taste things.
“About two years ago, I just started to practice making tracks, dreaming that I was in my studio and creating tracks almost instantaneously, usually in my studio with the normal bits of gear, or in my studio with imaginary bits of gear, and then alternating it every time I went to sleep. [And] waking up, trying to remember the sounds.
Request Magazine (July 1994)
“At first, I couldn’t remember anything at all. I could remember having a dream and doing something, the same way you have a nightmare and then wake up and you can’t remember it. Same sort of thing. Melodies I’ve got perfect now. I can almost always remember melodies. But sounds, you can’t get them the same. It’s like when you explain dreams to people, it can’t come out the same. It’s the same thing when I’m trying to create sounds. They never come out the same.”
In stark contrast to the previous quotations concerning lucid dreaming found in this section of the article is this one from Richard from The Lizard Magazine in 1995. Here Richard seemingly denies the scope/effect of lucid dream on his creative output and says “it got blown out of proportion”.
“…do you still dream your music?”
“I never really did it that much,” replied the hunched figure. “It got blown out of proportion. It’s about one in seven tracks, but they’re always ambient tracks
The Lizard (April/May 1995)
Press Rumblings…
Midway through 1993 tentative details of a second ambient collection from Richard began to emerge in music periodicals such as the NME and Music Technology Magazine. According to the three sequential quotes below, the initial release date of Volume II was September of 1993. For unknown reasons the release of the album got pushed back several months to March of the following year. The suggestion that the album was completed prior to June of 1993 gives further credence to the theory that all of the tracks might have been finished by late 1992 or early 1993 at the latest.
‘Ambient Works 2’ is due from Warp in September. Not an archive collection but fresh material because, as Evil Twin Richard chuckles, “I haven’t actually made a new record yet.”
NME (5th June 1993)
Richard finished Selected Ambient Works Volume II a year ago. Since then, several hundred tracks have been finished. “There are twenty-four tracks on the new album, well, last week I also put together twenty-four tracks. From your perspective, this is my new album, but for me, it’s just such a small part of what I do: not even one percent of what I’ve created has been released on record.
OOR Magazine (March 1994)
Consolidating his position (and persona) on Warp a new Aphex Twin single is planned for August, culled from recently recorded material, followed by a further retrospective album in September, Selected Ambient Works Volume 2.
presumably the single alluded to in this quote and the one immediately below was ‘On’. Music Technology Magazine (July 1993)
Richard James, electronics whizz-kid and Aphex Twin, has finally signed a 6-album deal with Warp which will see him promoted in the USA and Far East. The deal still gives James the freedom to release records on his own Rephlex label, The first fruits of the deal, the triple album Selected Ambient Works 2 will be released in October with a single and full worldwide tour to promote it.
Music Technology Magazine (September 1993)
Local Cornish newspaper West Briton & Cornwall Gazette gives the revised release date of Selected Ambient Works Volume II as the beginning of 1994:
Configurations
Whereas before his friends decided the pieces, Selected Ambient Works Two is totally Richard’s doing: With an interesting slant. “What I have been doing is playing this game…if it was up to me, really, I would just say I like these tracks so I’ll just put them out. But I think if I had done that, I would have scared everyone else off. So I thought if I get a bigger following, I’ll get even more freedom so then I’ll put out more what I would normally put out.”
B-Side Magazine (April/May 1994)
Although Volume II was eventually released across multiple compact discs and records(depending on format), It could have possibly been an even more monumental release; as Richard envisaged the album spread across five discs:
“there’s a second volume of “Ambient Works”, this time on Warp. It could be a triple album. Perhaps even a quadruple.”
Melody Maker Interview (June 1993)
“The new ambient album is going to be a triple album. I wanted it to be five albums but that’s a bit too long probably.”
NME, (January 8th 1994)
“Selected Ambient Works Vol. 2,” is a triple album (double-CD) that Mr. James reluctantly cut down from quintuple length.
New York Times (13th March 1994)
Perhaps the practical implications of creating an album that would be so lengthy and prohibitively expensive to produce induced horror in the minds of record executives up and down the land. Some of the tracks destined for the chopping block did eventually surface via Richard’s user18081971 SoundCloud account, and perhaps also found their way on to releases such as Analogue Bubblebath Volume 3 and the On Remixes EP. You can read about these outtakes on this previously written article.
“For a man who legendarily goes without sleep, the 22-year-old Richard James (for that is the name his parents gave him, not Aphex Twin, AFX, Polygon Window nor any of his other recording aliases) is remarkably affable. However, we encounter him in the midst of a Herculean task: he is trying to edit down the second volume of his Ambient Works – a double, triple or quintuple album for release on Sheffield’s mighty Warp label early in 1994”
Mojo Magazine (January/February 1994)
The quote above from Mojo Magazine in early 1994 gives us a possible reason why the release of Volume II was delayed by several months. The reason being that choosing a tracklist from such a wealth of material and editing this material down to a coherent tracklisting for the album was a ‘Herculean task’. another reason for the album’s delay was reported in Melody Maker in January of 1994, the reason given here was Richard’s many live appearance of the period taking precedence:
The release has been delayed because of Aphex Twin’s heavy live schedule over the last few months.
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
“I’ve had so many arguments with c—‘s over the business side this year, people trying to rip me off, that it took a while to get it sorted out.
NME (January 8th 1994)
The tracks omitted from Volume II are in my subjective opinion no way inferior to the tracks that ended up on the released album and I’d like to think one day there will be a augmented release where all the tracks in contention for the five disc version of the album emerges with all the trimmings.
One final oddity in regards to ideas that never came to fruition is this mention of a ‘graphic novel’ by Jon Savage from his book Machine Soul: A History Of Techno. I’ve yet to ascertain if this was ever a serious proposition but the idea of graphic novel accompanying Volume II is certainly a fascinating concept. Sadly this is the only quote that I have found that mentions it:
Acid Power Station
“What does it sound like? Like standing in a power station. On acid.”
NME, (January 8th 1994)
“Power stations are wicked,” Richard says. “If you just stand in the middle of a really massive one, you get a really weird presence and you’ve got that hum. You just feel electricity around you. That’s totally (dreamy?) for me. It’s just like a right strange dimension.”
The Face Magazine (March 1994)
With their visceral twitter, clubbing percussion and stone-age (names?), tracks such as “73 Yips”, “I Keata” (Iketa), “Phloam” and “Flap Head” (Flaphead) sounded like reasonably conventional dance tracks that had been sabotaged in the cutting room by a driller killer. That particular Aphex Twin is not present on the new Warp triple LP. A serene, disembodied collection, “Selected Ambient Works Volume II”, is the aural equivalent to a photo-album filled with gorgeous Polaroids.
Too many current ambient tracks lack the content to bear repeated listening, but I can imagine returning to these 25 (…what are they – crepuscular vignettes?) at any time and in any environment sun, darkness, dawn, twilight, the bath, the car, in the sea, flying, loud, soft. (to be?) sad or to feel good, alone or with people, in my body or out of it. For the record company, Richard has compared them with “standing in a power station on acid”. For the record, they sound mighty close to Brian Eno’s “Another Green World” period, but the power station analogy is apt.
The Face Magazine (March 1994) //check magazine and get it scanned
Artwork
The sleeve artwork for Volume II serves a dual function; firstly, as with any record sleeve it is simply something to appreciate and ruminate over whilst listening to the music itself. Secondly, in perhaps a more important function; it servers as a pictorial representation of the tracks themselves.
“The album, a triple vinyl and double CD and cassette set, will be released on Warp Records at the end of February. The 25 tracks (24 on the CD) are identified by photographs of textures rather than by titles.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
Due to the compositional techniques used for the creation of the album (i.e. lucid dreaming) being of a fundamentally different nature to that of his previous output, Richard perhaps felt that providing literal names to the tracks was an unsuitable method to use on this occasion:
The Aphex Twin shares none of these vices. Mind you. Led Zep IV style, there are no titles to the tracks on “Selected Ambient Works II, merely “textures”. Why?
“Well, three-quarters of the album came about through lucid dreaming,” explains Richard.
Melody Maker (12th March 1994)
As Volume II has no official track titles; apart from Blue Calx, several sepia toned photographs are used in lieu of words to differentiate one track from another. The photographs themselves are of various objects and textures shot with a soft focus, they are more often than not zoomed in which lends the subject matter a deliberately vague and ambiguous appearance.
In the quote below Richard makes a direct analogy between the abstract, uncertain nature of these photographs and his own music:
Richard’s photos, which adorn ‘Ambient Works II’, look like the sort of thing you might see if you were an ambient house fly with bad eyesight. They’re excellent.
“I like pictures where you can see millions of different things from one image,” he says. “I don’t like a direct image where you can say, ‘that’s a so-and-so.’ Because that’s it. It’s over then. You just identified it and it’s gone. I prefer something to have some sort of abstract form; that’s a bit close to why I like electronic instruments and music, because it does the same kind of thing for me.”
NME (26th March 1994)
Preliminary Design
The task of designing Volume II’s artwork fell to Richard’s friend; graphic designer and artist Paul Nicholson. Paul had previously collaborated with Richard on the design of the Aphex Twin logo/symbol which featured most prominently on the front cover of Selected Ambient Works Volume ’85-’92 and has been used by on all Aphex Twin records and ephemera ever since. In the following quote , Paul explains the concept and methodology behind his design in response to a art student’s query in 1994:
The basic concept behind the ambient 2 design was to create a non-written track-listing where categorisation of the tracks was based on their time signatures. Firstly i had to establish a system that would work across all 3 formats (l.p. c.d. m.c.) to this end the 25 tracks of the collection divided into 6 groups these being 5 groups of 4 and 1 group of 5. From this point on all design work was entirely structured on mathematics. Each track playing time, the overall length of each group and the total playing time of the collection was worked out. Once all the various times were established (as in 60 seconds per minute) they were converted into decimal. With the times in decimal it was then possible to convert each of the track times into a percentage of its respective group. The reason for the conversion of time into decimal percentages was so that a graphic representation of time could be created. In the case of ambient 2 this was achieved through the use of pie charts
.As well as the pie chart each track’s time is represented also by the dimensions of the photograph they appear in. To establish the dimensions of each photograph the total usable surface area dedicated to them had to be worked out and then divided by 6 for each group of tracks. The area allocated to each group was further divided by the percentages given to each track. From the area allocation of each track its dimensions were worked out. For example: each of the six groups on the l.p. format was allocated 130cm2. Group a being 25 minutes 58 seconds became 25.96 (once converted to decimal.) Track a1 being 7 minutes 32 seconds became 7.53. Track a1 became 29% of group a.. 29% of 130cm2 is 38 cm2 which ended up with a photograph of dimensions 5 x 7.6cm. this method was used to determine the area of the photographs across all three formats with the area allocation obviously differing due to the size differential between the formats.
Each pie chart within the photograph has 1 segment that is filled in which refers to the track it represents with the segments being arranged from 0-360 degrees clockwise. to help distinguish each of the 6 groups of tracks colour coding was adopted. For example: track a1 pie chart segment was located between 0-104 degrees and is coloured olive. Once all the above was completed the layout of the photographs was based on aesthetic judgement following a loose grid system. The work for this collection was started December 1993 with 1 month given to its completion. With hindsight more time would have meant a closer realisation to what i had hoped to achieve as i feel there is not enough visual clues as to what i was getting at. As far as ambient 2 is concerned i have had no other opportunity to follow this line of thought, and probably won’t through music related graphic work, but have continued to experiment generally with aspects of visual communication
Prototype 21 faxatak: 11:11:94
f.a..o. Matthew james.
Newport school of art.
Re. Can you help me prototype 21?
In his dreams the songs also have no titles, so they were given pictures, in subdued brown. ‘Most people see images when they listen to music. With this music I only saw shades of yellow, I have no idea why. I hate yellow, so I didn’t want to use that colour. And a hassle that you then have to deal with. All this whining: why can’t you just come up with titles?’
OOR Magazine (March 1994)
The reason for not naming the new tracks is related to his synaesthetic ability. Synaesthesia is another word for hearing colours or seeing sounds. Whenever he hears music he enjoys, he sees one of his least favourite colours, which is yellow, Rather than fix music with words (even invented nouns or numbers), he is searching for a way to identify compositions with colour.
The Face Magazine (March 1994)
On the 7th of March 2024, to Mark the albums 30th anniversary Paul reposted a series of in-depth Instagram posts describing the design process behind the Volume II’s artwork and shared several preliminary sketches from his notebook:
Firstly, I had to establish a system that would work across all three formats (LP/CD/MC). The primary format was the LP which, for Selected Ambient Works Volume 2, was to be a triple vinyl release. The 25 tracks that make up the LP were split over three discs. With each disc having two sides, that is 6 groups, these being 5 sides with 4 tracks and 1 side with 5 tracks.
Having established a system of grouping, from that point on all design work was structured around geometry and the mathematics thereof; Each track’s playing time, the overall length of each group and the total playing time of the whole collection being worked out.
Once I had all the various time signatures (minutes and seconds) they were converted into decimal. With the track times and lengths of each side in decimal, it was then possible to convert each track into a percentage within its respective group.
The conversion into a percentage was so that a graphic representation could be created for each track that made up the LP. In Selected Ambient Works 2, this was achieved primarily through the use of pie charts. As well as the pie chart, all the tracks are also represented by a photograph. The playing time of each track dictates the dimensions of the photographs.
To work out the dimensions of the photographs for all three formats (LP/CD/MC), the total usable surface area of each had to be worked out. This figure was divided by 6 for each of the groups of tracks. The area allocated to each group was further divided by the percentages given to each track. From the area allocation of each track, its dimensions were worked out.
Each of the six groups on the LP Format was allocated 130cm2.
Disc 1, Side A, being 25 minutes 58 seconds became 25.96 (once converted to decimal.) Track A1, being 7 minutes 32 seconds became 7.53.
Track A1 became 29% of group A.
29% of 130cm2 is 38 cm2 which gave me the photograph of dimensions 5 x 7.6cm.
This method was used to determine the area of the photographs across all three formats with the area allocation obviously differing due to the size differential between the formats. Each pie chart within the photograph has one segment that is filled in which refers to the track it represents. The track segments are arranged from 0-360 degrees, clockwise.
To distinguish each of the 6 groups of tracks colour coding or various earthy tones was adopted, sympathetic to the sepia photographs.
For example:
Track A1 pie chart segment was located between 0-104 degrees and is olive in colour.Once all the tracks had been allocated a photo and the dimensions and pie charts worked out, the layout was one of aesthetic judgement. Put simply, placing things where I thought looked good.
The design work for Selected Ambient Works Volume 2 was started late summer 1993 and delivered to WARP in January 1994.
Paul Nicholson, Instagram (March 7th 2024)
Featured in the image gallery directly below are photos of Richard’s Yamaha CS-5 synthesiser, which was eventually sold on eBay around 2020. On the bottom plate of the CS-5, Richard scratched several paragraphs of text; a photograph of these etchings would serve as liner notes for the back sleeve of the physical release of Selected Ambient Works Volume II.
Track by Track
Disc One Side A, Key Colour Olive Yellow
Cliffs
Radiator
Rhubarb
do you have any outtakes from your barbican or polish robot orchestra performances?
Syrobonkers interview (November 2014)
rich: Yes many, not properly mixed down though but heres a couple for starters! this was the very first rhythmic tryouts, they got better before the sofware crashed, next time i will nail the bugger! 2nd is rehearsal for orc version of a saw2 track that never got performed…backwards..
Hankie
Disc One Side B Colour key Brown Green
Grass
Mould
Curtains
Blur
Weathered Stone
Disc Two Side A Key Colour Brownish Orange
Tree
Domino
White Blur 1
Disc Two Side B
Blue Calx
Blue Calx was initially released over a year prior to Selected Ambient Works Volume II on ART Record’s ambient compilation ‘The Philosophy of Sound And Machine’ in October of 1992. This date corresponds well with a quote from Richard, in which he tells us that Blue Calx was possibly the final track he recorded at Lannerlog bedroom studio, before he moved to London to start his degree in electronics:
Recorded in Linmiri [Lannerlog bedroom studio], probably the last track I ever recorded in that house, quite fitting really, end of that era. I made it when coming back to visit my parents in Cornwall after moving away to go to college to do a degree in microelectronic engineering, which I thankfully never finished, was so boring, always preferred teaching myself, so much more satisfying, letting your mind wander where it needs to go. I heard Derrick May pressed this up onto vinyl so he could DJ it, I wonder if that was true?
Aphex Twin Webstore (2017)
Interestingly a release using the similarly named Blue Calyx alias was planned for Derrick May’s Transmat Records, Obviously this never came to fruition.
In a 1993 interview with Melody Maker, Richard seemed to have had the intention of reusing the Blue Calx alias for future ambient releases:
“The pseudonyms don’t really represent parts of my own personality; it’s more of a musical thing, so people know what they’re buying. You know, so if they hate ambient, they won’t get landed with an ambient record. I use different names for different projects. It started off (well ?) defined, but it’s got really distorted. It’ll all go back in line. Like, Blue Calx should be covering the ambient outlook, while Aphex Twin will probably be for harder stuff.”
Melody Maker (1st May 1993)
Parallel Stripes
Shiny Metal Rods
Grey Stripe
A excerpt of Grey Stripe was used as an an ident/break-bumper for the MTV Europe program Chill Out Zone sometime in the mid 1990s. Thanks to JOHNNY for bringing this to my attention.
Z Twig
Disc Three Side A
Windowsill
Stone In Focus
Stone in Focus was omitted from all compact disc releases of Selected Ambient Works Volume II due to the physical limitations of the format. Stone in Focus was however present on both on vinyl & cassette editions of the album. It was also separately available on CD with the Excursions In Ambience (The Third Dimension) compilation released in 1994.
Initially the digital rerelease of Selected Ambient Works Volume II was uploaded to the aphetwin.net webstore without Stone in Focus due to the condition of the original recording media. In this case Stone in Focus was recorded to a U-matic analogue video cassette tape, a format widely used in television production from the 1970s onwards.
Richard mentioned that this tape had to be ‘baked’ which might sound like a strange term to those unfamiliar with the preservation of physical media. In this case it refers to the method of subjecting the tape to a high temperature for several hours to remove excess moisture so it can be played back without the magnetic recording layer delaminating from the base of the tape itself. This undesirable issue is known as sticky-shed syndrome and can gum up a tape machine or physically destroy the music you are trying to retrieve.
Thankfully the baking procedure worked and Stone in Focus was eventually uploaded to the webstore from its first generation source in optimal quality.
This track has now thankfully been found and uploaded here, I was very worried it had been lost, very relieved*** It was not included on the original CD’s as there wasn’t enough room. I usually always give priority to the vinyl versions of all my releases as I never ever really liked CD’s much, think I would have liked CD’s a little bit more if you could put 90 mins on them, who decided they were to be 74 mins anyway? Thinking about this now I’d love to try and get Warp to do high quality chrome cassette versions of all my Warp musics, maybe even metal ones if possible. If I wait a year or so for this I could include all the extras on the cassettes as there would be plenty of room, would have to sign the tracks over to Warp first for a physical release, something I don’t have to do for this website but that shouldn’t be too difficult.
Stone in focus
Hexagon
Lichen
Disc Three Side B
Spots
“Someone I used to know, you know who you are, worked as a cleaner in a police station and kindly pinched me a police interview tape. It was with a woman who murdered her husband, it’s the background audio in this track.”
Aphex Twin Webstore comment (2017)
Tassels
“featuring an EMS synthi ‘a’, mk1, Studiomaster star mixer, recorded 184 Southgate road, 1st floor, London. Bought the synthi when I was about 19 from Robin wood at ems, Ladock, Cornwall. Saved all my money for it for a long time, one of the first synths I ever bought and I know that machine inside and out, magical piece of equipment, always felt like it was made specially for me.”
Aphex Twin Webstore comment (2017)
White Blur 2
White Blur 2 contains a sample of children laughing which can also be found on the track (CAT 00897-A1) for Analogue Bubblebath Volume 3
Matchsticks
Outtakes
While Selected Ambient Works Volume II is already a lengthy double album, Richard had originally envisioned it to be even longer. At one point, Volume II was considered to potentially span five discs, making it a quintuple album. However, the prohibitive cost of manufacturing the physical media necessary for such an extensive release likely led to this plan never materializing. Below are couple of relevant quotes:
“I wanted it to be five albums but that’s a bit too long probably.”
NME (January 8th 1994)
During Richard’s SoundCloud musical deluge of 2015 he mentioned that there were many tracks left off the released record:
blowfin says at 2:35:
Any more SAW II material that didn’t quite make it to the full release?Posted 4 hours ago4 hoursuser18081971 says at 2:35:
Richard replying to a user on SoundCloud about additional SAW II music (circa 2015)
@blowfin: yeah there is a load but cant find the dat for the moment
You can listen to some of these tracks in a previous article written for the Lanner Chronicle here: Selected Ambient Works Vol II Outtakes.
Reception & Press Reaction
It just so happens that we are talking right before Selected Ambient Works II is coming out, during the NASA tour, but Richard’s main goal isn’t to flog his latest album. He’s talking because he loves what he does. Although he knows the record company thinks otherwise… “I was supposed to be playing tracks of the singles from the album in New York. Warp records even came out. Then I didn’t play any of the tracks from the album and they were like ‘why didn’t you play them’ and I said ‘I didn’t feel like it’” he laughs, spots of red appearing on his pale cheeks. “I said ‘I almost played it but I wasn’t into it.’ And they were like,” as he frowns quite deeply, “but they didn’t want to argue with me,” he now grins.
B-Side Magazine (April/May 1994)
“I haven’t made a conscious attempt to change direction with the new album. It was just something that I wanted to do at the time. As far as I’m concerned, it is 100 times more interesting than the first ‘Ambient Works’. I don’t know what other people are going to think about it, but I don’t actually care if people love it or hate it.”
Melody Maker (22nd January 1994)
Despite such audience-baiting tactics from James, Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works Vol. II bombed in the U.S., selling so poorly that an internal memo circulated at James’ label, Sire, stating that all ambient projects forthwith cancelled.
Alternative Press (May 1997)
As Richard has often said, he doesn’t give a shit. And as much as he professes not to care about Selected Ambient Works 2’s sales, Richard admits he’s curious to see how it does in America. But he still concludes, “If it sells a million copies I’ll go all right, yeah. If it sells no copies I’ll still go all right, yeah,” he shrugs. “My interest is on that level.”
B-Side Magazine (April/May 1994)
“Selected Ambient Works II”, his latest album, sounds like the prehistoric noises emanating from a distant uninhabited planet a galaxy away.
Melody Maker (12th March 1994)
“I think Aphex Twin is a fucking genius. He’s got my top billing and respect. Selected Ambient Works Vol. 2 is a better Brian Eno record than Eno’s ever made, I think that’s a fucking masterpiece.”
Trent Reznor speaking to Spin Magazine (November 1996)
Aphex Twin
Selected Ambient Works
Volume II (Warp)
The prolific Richard James returns with a product of nothing less than epic proportions. Of course, unlike Ben Hur, you don’t have to experience Selected Ambient Works Volume II from start to finish in order to avoid losing the plot. This is a long and deep pool of sound that you can dip into at any point and float around in. The title follows on from the independently successful compilation on R&S from about a year ago, and refers to Richard’s habit of choosing from his own extensive and unreleased back catalogue as opposed to conceiving and recording a new album serially. In this respect, listener and artist are united in a spirit of random access.
Don’t expect the pool to be always at body temperature, though. What singles out this collection, apart from the final and inevitable abandonment of beats almost entirely, is a mood of unmitigated melancholy, which borders at times on a kind of horror. There are some heart rending timbres which breathe in and out of this recording, like the last slow gasps of some stranded alien creature. The idea of simply relaxing to it us nonsense the textures are too demanding. Perhaps its natural home is on a soundtrack, and sure enough further Aphex selections will accompany a film from the Stakker stable in due course. In the meantime, the release of six sides (on vinyl and cassette – two on CD) of such chilling beauty throughout (that’s chilling in the spooky sense as well, kids) is a measure of the new ambient school’s justifiable convidence. PW
The Aphex Twin
Selected Ambient Works Vol. 2
Sire/US/CD
This second volume of Selected Ambient Works contains 24 tracks of Richard James’ most minimal work yet. Gone are the squelchy noises and thunderous beats. Voices of children, soft strings and sine waves make up this collection, which represents the development of James as composer rather than programmer. This work shows that electronic music can still retain complexity and emotion in a world of derivative records and sampling wars. MC
Aphex Twin
Selected Ambient Works, Volume II
Warner Bros/Sire Records
This double-CD set is being termed the best ambient offering to come from Aphex Twin by the people who know – the DJs. The influence of ambient legend Brian Eno is apparent throughout. There are no inappropriate samples to confuse, only thoughtfully composed pieces to transport you. The tracks bear no names: they are in typical Aphex Twin style – anonymous, allowing listeners to create their own titles. This interstellar voyage completes its acoustic mission by discovering previously unexplored environments and transmitting new emotions. – Lisa Ferrara
Lanner Chronicle 