IT SEEMED like an inspired idea, conducting an interview with Richard James – also known as the Aphex Twin, the enfant terrible of modern ambient music – high up in the Whispering Gallery at St Paul’s Cathedral. One could fancifully imagine his work, which has more in common with that of classical composers like Bach or Satie than with most pop, drifting through arches and wafting about domes like electronic madrigals. This is a beautiful thought.
It quickly becomes apparent however, that James has an ulterior motive for meeting here. He reaches into his bag and pulls out his latest toy, a “scanner” which he bought a few weeks ago in Tottenham Court Road for £550. The scanner looks like a transistor radio, but as James flicks the dial, fragments of mobile telephone conversations (other people’s conversations!) spill out of the speaker. At this altitude, it should be possible to hear every such exchange within a four mile radius. Using the same device, a friend of his recorded the “Squidgy gate” tapes, he explains. “It’s amazing what you can pick up. This is much better than EastEnders.” Indeed.
The Aphex Twin, whose Selected Ambient Works Volume I LP was arguably the most influential contemporary record released last year, is the scion of a new breed of pop star. The electronic “dance” music, of which he is the most fêted exponent, is an expression of the first British youth movement in which the indigenous music press has played no significant part. Where past generations of stage stricken boys dreamed of learning to play guitar and glower from the cover of Melody Maker, James spent his early years ensconced in his bedroom, pulling apart and rebuilding synthesisers, trying to coax new sounds from them. By his own account, he has no time for the media or for the vagaries of stardom. Like many of his generation, who’ve grown-up with the computer revolution, his primary interest is in technology. And in sound.
Like many of his generation, who’ve grown-up with the computer revolution, his primary interest is in technology. And in sound.
James is the son of a Cornish tin miner. Now 21, he was only 13 when he began recording the tunes which appeared on Ambient Works Volume 1. Remarkably, in this day and age, it contained no sampling, no digital gimmickry of any kind. This lent the record a “warm” analogue feel, and uncluttered purity of melody and timbre reminiscent of the work of early electro pioneers, Kraftwerk. Strange that music made exclusively with machines is now capable of sounding somehow classic, even old-fashioned.
The explanation for this is that ambient music has a history. Brian Eno, the former Roxy Music non-musician, Bowie and U2 producer, is often credited with having first formulated the idea. Noting how sound could affect the way a listener experienced three-dimensional space – ask any shopping mall manager about this – Eno saw ambient music as something to be consumed on a sub-conscious level. For an example of his theory in practice, listen to the production of U2’s With Or Without You from the Joshua Tree album; this record succeeds on the strength of all the things you’re not listening to in the mix. Stockhausen, Philip Glass and John Cage (most notoriously on his 4’33” of silence) has all experimented with similar ideas.
The current vogue for ambience may have more to do with drugs than with unfettered artistic endeavour. The monstrous success of post-Acid House (circa 1988) dance music opened the door for electronic artists like the Aphex Twin. This genre embraced many of the principles of ambience, but to be fully appreciated, something extra was required. Enter the drug Ecstasy.
By the middle of 1992, though, clubbers and ravers had made a startling discovery. Taken in excess, this stuff messed you up, Suddenly, “E” was out and the gentler highs afforded by cannabis smoking were in. This called for a different type of soundtrack, something mellower and more seductive. Ambient music re-emerged to fill the demand, though it remains true that almost any form of music (dub reggae, avant-garde classical, be-bop jazz), when pushed to its extremes tends to become ambient. Could it be that ambience exists in nature?
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.
James reckons this visceral quality to be a by-product of the way he currently writes. 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.
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