Myths Of The Near Future

Bottom/ Surfing The Void (Polydor Records, 2010) is the second studio album by British alternative rock band Klaxons. The album was produced by "The Godfather of Nu Metal" Ross Robinson, and was recorded in Los Angeles, California. Bassist and vocalist Jamie Reynolds described the work as a "prog doom" album. Media response to Surfing the Void was generally favorable, with many professional reviews commented on the band's progression from their 2007 debut album, Myths of the Near Future. BBC reviewer Andy Fyfe noted the band's move away from their New Rave labelling, comparing the band favorably to The Prodigy and Depeche Mode. HMV describes Klaxons as "acid-rave sci-fi punk-funk", a phrase lifted directly from Tim Chester's Radar feature in NME. Though the band's sound is rock-based, they draw upon some less common influences - notably the rave culture of the 1990s, represented in their covers of rave hits "The Bouncer" by Kicks Like a Mule and "Not Over Yet" by Grace. Top/ Say It is the second studio album by Canadian indie rock band Born Ruffians, released on June 1st, 2010, by Paper Bag Records in Canada and Warp Records worldwide. They have toured with artists such as Franz Ferdinand, Caribou, Hot Chip, The Hidden Cameras and Tokyo Police Club. In 2009 they recorded a cover of two Aphex Twin songs for Warp20 (Recreated), a compilation. Say It is the follow-up to their 2008 LP, Red, Yellow & Blue. Born Ruffians, formerly known as Mornington Drive, are a Canadian indie rock band formed in 2004, originally from Midland, Ontario, located near Georgian Bay. They are currently signed to Warp Records.

If We Don't Make It We'll Fake It

Bottom/ Scissor Sisters did it again with the gay/hedonist anthem "Filthy/Gorgeous" (Polydor, 2005), the seventh track on their self-titled debut album. Scissor Sisters is an American band named after a sex position between two women. Their style draws from disco, glam rock, pop and the club scene of New York City. Their first hit was in 2004 with the release of a disco cover of the Pink Floyd classic "Comfortably Numb". Several media outlets have noted that Scissor Sisters 'stick out like a sore thumb' on the list of artists who have sold over 2 million copies of an album in the UK in the 21st century — the others being James Blunt, Robbie Williams, Keane, Dido, Coldplay, and Norah Jones — all artists considered 'mainstream' or 'middle of the road', as opposed to the Scissor Sisters' brash and controversial image. Middle/ After a seven year wait, The Prodigy's fourth studio album Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned (XL Recordings) was released in Summer 2004. It is the first studio album by the electronica act after 1997's The Fat of the Land and its highly controversial single "Smack My Bitch Up". The Prodigy are an electronic music group formed by Liam Howlett in 1990, in Braintree, Essex, England. Along with The Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim, The Crystal Method, and a few other lesser-known acts, they were pioneers of the Big Beat genre. The Prodigy are a difficult band to classify, because they have developed significantly with time and continue to innovate. Their music consists of various styles ranging from rave, hardcore, industrial and drum & bass in the early 1990s, to alternative rock and big beat with punk vocal elements in later times. They have sold over 16 million records worldwide which is unequaled in electronic music history. Top/ Canadian dance punk duo Death From Above 1979 played loud synth-infused drum and bass combination. Romance Bloody Romance: Remixes & B-Sides (Last Gang Records, 2005) is a collection of remixes of songs featured on the album You're a Woman, I'm a Machine.

Truth Doesn't Make A Noise

Top/ Meg White and Jack White of punk blues duo The White Stripes delve into truth as number one theme throughout the album Get Behind Me Satan (V2 Records, 2005). In 2006, it was included in 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, edited by Robert Dimery. On February 2, 2011, after a long hiatus, the duo announced that they would officially cease recording and performing music as The White Stripes. The announcement specifically denied any artistic differences or health issues, but cited "a myriad of reasons ... mostly to preserve what is beautiful and special about the band". The White Stripes was an American alternative rock duo, formed in 1997 in Detroit, Michigan. The group consisted of the songwriter Jack White (vocals, guitar, and keyboards) and drummer Meg White (drums and occasional vocals). After releasing several singles and three albums within the Detroit independent music underground, the White Stripes rose to prominence in 2002, as part of the garage rock revival scene. Their successful albums White Blood Cells and Elephant drew them attention from a large variety of media outlets in the United States and the UK. The White Stripes used a low-fidelity, do-it-yourself approach to writing and recording. Their music featured a melding of punk and blues influences and a raw simplicity of composition, arrangement, and performance. The duo was also noted for their fashion and design aesthetic which featured a simple color scheme of red, white, and black. The band has sold approximately 12 million albums worldwide, two million in the US alone, and their latest three albums have each won the Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album. Middle/ Rather Ripped (DGC, 2006) by American alternative rock band Sonic Youth is the last album the band had to release to fulfill their contractual obligation to Geffen Records. Formed in New York City in 1981, Sonic Youth are inspired by the guitar symphonies of Glenn Branca (with whom most of the band have performed), the heavy protopunk of The Stooges, the punk poetry of Patti Smith, the Krautrock of Can, the psychedelic garage rock of The 13th Floor Elevators, as well as avant-garde composers like John Cage. The band were often praised for "redefin[ing] what rock guitar could do" using a wide variety of unorthodox guitar tunings, and preparing guitars with objects like drumsticks and screwdrivers to alter the instruments' timbre. Bottom/ "You Don't Know What Love Is (You Just Do As You're Told)" is the second track to be released from The White Stripes' sixth studio album Icky Thump (XL Recordings, 2007), recorded at Nashville's Blackbird Studio. After Get Behind Me Satan, Icky Thump marks a return to the punk, garage rock and blues influences for which the band was known. Additionally, the album introduces Scottish folk music, avant-garde, trumpet, and bagpipes into the formula. Meg White has said one of her all-time favorite musicians is Bob Dylan; Jack claims "I've got three fathers – my biological dad, God and Bob Dylan".

Lazer Guided Melodies

Glasser is the one-woman orchestra of Cameron Mesirow. Her debut album, Ring (True Panther Sounds, 2010) is a singular work. Glasser entered public consciousness in 2009 with her debut EP, Apply, on True Panther, and a UK-only 12” on the Young Turks label. The intimate, luxurious music resonated widely, despite being made by Mesirow, alone and in airplanes and shoe stores, on GarageBand. With Ring, however, Mesirow worked for months with producer Ariel Rechtshaid to re-imagine her musical arrangements, incorporating organic instrumentation like strings, woodwinds, bass, and a wide array of percussion into her once-sparse recordings. Her simple, minimal melodies and rapturous vocals evoke, side by side, the optimism of a woman captivated by creation and travel, as well as the anxiety that accompanies nomadism and change. Of this duality, the New York Times said “these are beautiful songs, both sweet and abstract, deeply felt and anodyne.”

Lullabies To Paralyze

Top/ Fever Ray (Rabid Records, 2009) is the debut solo album from Fever Ray, an alias of Karin Dreijer Andersson of the electronic duo The Knife, formed in Sweden with her brother Olof Dreijer and currently on hiatus. It was widely praised. Andersson was previously the vocalist and guitarist of the alternative rock band Honey Is Cool. Her vocal style is notable for both shrill and deep, distorted tones combined with her distinctive accent and the use of pitch-shifting, while her image as a performer tends to include the wearing of masks and other theatrical elements. "If I Had a Heart", the first single of the album, was released digitally on 15 December 2008. In 2009 the collection of feminist pornographic shorts Dirty Diaries was released with a soundtrack composed by Andersson. The Knife have listed David Lynch, Laurie Anderson, Aki Kaurismäki, Korean cinema, Trailer Park Boys, Donnie Darko, Doom, and Black Hole as inspirations for their work. In addition, Olof Dreijer cited techno, grime, and Southern hip hop, while Andersson named Sonic Youth, Kate Bush, dEUS, Le Tigre and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Bottom/ Cosmic tunes for the party tonight. Acid Washed is a two-man process primarily, following the blueprint devised over the past year by Richard D’Alpert and Andrew Claristidge: two DJ’s keen on using modern and vintage equipment to create sophisticated electronics with a sharp pop aesthetic. The result is the self-titled Acid Washed (Records Makers, 2010), a fusion of late nineties French house vibes and DFA disco touches that acknowledges the influence of Chicago and Detroit without being overly reverential. Throw names like Steve Reich and Giorgio Moroder into the hat as well if you like. Artistic direction for the project comes from British designer Anthony Burrill. His striking, geometric visuals adorn their record sleeves as well as providing the hypnotic, focal point of their music videos and visceral live show.

Duchess Of Coolsville

Joanna Newsom is a harpist, pianist, harpsichordist, singer and songwriter from Nevada City, California. A follow-up to the The Milk-Eyed Mender (2004), her second album Ys (Drag City, 2006) (top) was named for a mythical city in Brittany, and features full orchestra arrangements by Van Dyke Parks and mixing by Drag City label-mate Jim O'Rourke. While the media have labeled her as one of the most prominent members of the modern psych folk movement, Newsom's songwriting incorporates elements of Appalachian music, avant-garde modernism, and African kora rhythms. On February 23, 2010 Drag City released Have One on Me as the official follow up to the harpirst's highly acclaimed second studio release, 2006's Ys. It is a triple album produced by herself and mixed by long-time collaborators Jim O'Rourke and Noah Georgeson, with the accompanying arrangements by Ryan Francesconi. Have One on Me received perfect scores and extremely positive evaluations by many publications, as well as earning Newsom favorable comparisons to other singer-songwriters such as Joni Mitchell, Laura Nyro, Rickie Lee Jones and Kate Bush. Allison Stewart of The Washington Post called Have One on Me "her magnum opus, a three-disc set being likened to a freak-folk Sandinista!, though it feels more like a musical Ulysses." Spin's Andy Beta expressed that Newsom "gives what few artists can deliver: a self-contained world of warmth, crystalline detail, and intimacy that lies far beyond a Twitter feed" in his 4 star review. Will Dean of The Guardian pointed that "at two-hours-plus, it's a record that demands concentration to appreciate its splatterings of beauty. But pour yourself a glass and listen, because they don't make them like this too often."

Break The Night With Colour

Bottom/ Fredo Viola is an American singer/songwriter and multi-media artist. He was born in London, England, but has resided in the United States for most of his life. He graduated from Tisch School of the Arts at NYU, but has always been most passionate about music. Viola lists some influential artists, such as Shostakovich, Britten, Bartok, Stravinsky and Belle & Sebastian. In 2004, "Let the Sad Out" was licensed for use in Jonathan Demme’s film The Manchurian Candidate. In 2007, he signed with French label Because Music. He released his debut album, The Turn, on December 2008. Most recently, "The Sad Song" was used in the 2008 film Birds of America. Viola currently lives in Woodstock, N.Y. Top/ In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Julia Stone of Australian singer-songwriter duo Angus & Julia Stone revealed she recorded a solo album in New York in late 2008. Her song "This Love" appears in the 2009 Australian film The Waiting City. She has described the album as mellow but darker and spookier in tone than the brother-sister duo's 2010 album Down The Way. On August 24, she confirmed the album would be called The Memory Machine. Both Angus and Julia have distinctive vocal styles. Their song "Big Jet Plane" came first on Triple J's Hottest 100 for 2010. The Sydney Morning Herald's Bernard Zuel described their vocals as such: "Her voice has a fractured feel like Jolie Holland; his has a smoke-on-the-beach drawl." UK journalist Johnny Sharp stated, "Most impressive, though, are the songs - simple but blindingly effective acoustic compositions, warm boy-girl harmonies and delicate, less-is-more arrangements. Resistance is surely futile."

Sons Of The Silent Age

Absolute Dissent (Spinefarm Records, 2010) is the fourteenth studio album by Killing Joke. Absolute Dissent has the sludgy sonic quality of their 2006 release Hosannas from the Basements of Hell, much of the same metal influence of their 2003 album Killing Joke, and the melodic grandeur of 1986's Brighter Than a Thousand Suns. Apocalypse, geopolitics, population, societal control, and random acts of kindness are some of the main themes in the album. The opening track, "Absolute Dissent", with its chopping guitar, the frantic dance beat, the hymn-like chorus, and the apocalyptic content, sounds utterly euphoric somehow mimic their classic 1980 song "Pssyche". The album's second track, "The Great Cull", is a heavy song in the style of their 2003 album, Killing Joke. It talks about Malthusianism, the Codex Alimentarius for creating a sick population, water fluoridation and dopamine increased in the brain, chemtrails, malleable population, and mass control to maintain the population preferably around 500 million. Single "European Super State", the most commercial track on the album, is a mixture of dance-punk, UK hard house, and electronic body music, with a soundscape fitting of Depeche Mode's Violator era. It is a continuation of their convictions about the European dream. Q magazine gave the album a rating of four stars out of five, pointing out that "The post-punk provocateurs' 13th album finds them straddling post-millennial metal and ritualistic pounding, Jaz Coleman still roaring like he's the only sane person in a world of fools". Killing Joke are an English post-punk band formed in October 1978 in Notting Hill, London, England. Founding members Jaz Coleman (vocals, keyboards) and Geordie Walker (guitars) have been the only constant members. A key influence on industrial rock, their early music was described by critics Stephen Thomas Erlewine and John Dougan as "quasi-metal ... dancing to a tune of doom and gloom," which gradually evolved over the years, incorporating elements of electronic music, synth-pop, gothic rock and alternative rock, though always emphasising Coleman's "savagely strident vocals."

Novocaine For The Soul

Philharmonics is the debut studio album by Danish singer-songwriter Agnes Obel. It was released by PIAS Recordings on 4 October 2010 in Denmark, Germany and other European countries. Agnes Caroline Thaarup Obel (born 1981) writes, plays, sings, records and produces all her material herself. She is influenced by artists such as Roy Orbison, Joni Mitchell, John Cale, Sonic Youth, Patti Smith, Joanna Newsom, Kate Bush and also by French composers Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel and Erik Satie. Philharmonics has garnered generally positive reviews, with James Skinner from BBC saying that "the compositions... are slow, sombre, sepulchral even, but not without a sense of occasionally singular beauty". In Musicomh, Ben Edgell writes: "Obel sings with a hushed and tender grace that waxes wistful and serene over yearning cello, harp, and piano vignettes. She's a fey siren, with a dusky, near-whispered vocal that speaks to Ane Brun or Eva Cassidy." In the French cultural magazine Les Inrockuptibles, Johanna Seban mentions a "disarming purity". All of the songs in Philharmonics - except for "Close Watch" (by John Cale) & "Katie Cruel" (a folk traditional) - are original work. Obel lives in Berlin.

Hydrogen Jukebox

Maximum Balloon is the solo album debut of record producer and musician David Andrew Sitek, released on September 21, 2010 on Interscope . Maximum Balloon was number 24 on Rolling Stone's list of the 30 Best Albums of 2010. David Andrew Sitek (born 1972) is a guitarist and record producer based in New York City, best known as a member of the band TV on the Radio. He has also worked with bands such as Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Liars, Foals, and Celebration, and produced free jazz-influenced remixes of songs by artists such as Beck and Nine Inch Nails. He is also a photographer and painter. Though Sitek has collaborated with several Brooklyn-based indie bands he looks upon the indie music movement with skepticism. In an interview with the Danish music magazine Soundvenue he explains that he is dissatisfied with the opportunistic turn music has taken, referring to the self-promoting indie bands moving to Brooklyn only to claim that they are from "the creative mecca" in order to get the attention of music magazines. "Those bands complaining about other bands selling out, got their iPod filled up with illegal music". This may explain why Sitek has settled down on the West coast in Beverly Hills, California. On his solo project Maximum Balloon Sitek collaborates with many of his old friends (among these are Karen O, David Byrne and Kyp Malone from TV on the Radio), whom he claims are still interested in creating beautiful songs, not only songs that the music magazines want to write about, which, he thinks, keeps the music interesting. In April 2008, Sitek was named Number One in NME's Future 50 list of the most forward thinking people in music today.

This Ain't No Disco

Top/ The front cover of Talking Heads' second album, More Songs about Buildings and Food (Sire, 1978), was conceived and executed by David Byrne. It is a photomosaic of the band made of 529 close-up Polaroid photographs. More Songs about Buildings and Food is Talking Heads' second album, the first of a string of three produced with Brian Eno. Driven by its rhythm section, the band's blend of funky bass, bubblegum, country, reggae and punk influences, with David Byrne's nerdy, off-kilter voice, established the group as a critical success known for their rabid live shows. Bottom/ Created by the notable graphic designer Tibor Kalman to represent the electro-centric direction the band had taken, the cover of Remain In Light (Sire Records, 1980) shows digitally distorted faces of Talking Heads band members. A mind-warping classic produced by Brian Eno, the album features funky African polyrythms. Eno and Byrne released the groundbreaking My Life In The Bush of Ghosts a year later.

Songs That Make A Difference

Top/ "This Is Radio Clash" (CBS) is a single released by The Clash in 1981. "This Is Radio Clash", like their previous single "The Magnificent Seven", is a dub reggae, rap, punk-funk song that was influenced by old school hip hop acts from New York City, like the Sugarhill Gang and Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five. The Clash were an English punk rock band that formed in 1976 as part of the original wave of UK punk. Along with punk rock, they experimented with reggae, ska, dub, funk, rap and rockabilly. The Clash's politicized lyrics, musical experimentation, and rebellious attitude had a far-reaching influence on rock, alternative rock in particular. Their record label's A&R director dubbed them "The Only British Band That Matters," which fans picked up and transformed into "The Only Band That Matters". Middle/ Sandinista! is the fourth album by The Clash. It was released in 1980 on CBS as a triple album containing 36 tracks, with 6 songs on each side. Some critics have argued that the album would have worked better as a less-ambitious, smaller project. Others think of the album as a breakthrough that deserves comparison to the Beatles' White Album. Dub versions for some of the songs and toasting was done by Mikey Dread, who had first hooked up with the band for their 1980 single "Bankrobber". With Sandinista! the band reached beyond punk and reggae into dub, rhythm and blues, calypso, gospel and whatever else. The album clearly displays the influence of reggae and in particular producer Lee "Scratch" Perry (who had worked with the band on their 1977 single "Complete Control"), with a dense, echo-filled sound on even the straight rock songs. The song "Washington Bullets" was Clash lyric-writer Joe Strummer's most extensive--and most specific--political statement to date. In it, Strummer name checks conflicts or controversies from around the world; namely in Chile, Nicaragua, Cuba, Afghanistan and Tibet. The rock music world hailed Sandinista! as a masterpiece. Bottom/ "The Magnificent Seven" (CBS) was the third single from Sandinista! The song was recorded in April 1980 at Electric Lady Studios in New York City, built around a bass loop played by Norman Watt-Roy of the Blockheads. Joe Strummer wrote the words on the spot, a technique that was also used to create Sandinista!'s other rap track, "Lightning Strikes (Not Once But Twice)". "The Magnificent Seven" represents the first attempt by a rock band to write and perform original rap music, and one of the earliest examples of hip hop records with political and social content. It is the first major white rap record, predating the recording of Blondie's "Rapture" by six months.

Pop Will Eat Itself

Bottom/ Distortion (Nonesuch, 2008) is an album by The Magnetic Fields. As the album's name implies, several of the musical performances featured were distorted by various means. In particular, this sound quality was influenced by the 1985 album Psychocandy by The Jesus and Mary Chain. No synthesizers were used to record the album; it is the second in a "no-synth trilogy", after the 2004 album i and before the 2010 album Realism. The Magnetic Fields is the principal creative outlet of singer-songwriter Stephin Merritt. While the particular musical style of the band is usually as malleable as Merritt's songwriting, they are commonly attributed to pop genres and subgenres: synthpop, indie pop, noise pop, and, most recently, folk-pop. The band is recognizable for Merrit's lyrics, often about love, that are by turns ironic, bitter, and humorous. Their best known work is likely the critically lauded 1999 three-volume concept album 69 Love Songs. Middle/ Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (Todomundo, 2008) is the first collaboration between David Byrne and Brian Eno since 1981's My Life in the Bush of Ghosts and Eno's work producing and co-writing with Talking Heads. Both have described it as "electronic Gospel", in particular the track "Life Is Long." Byrne has speculated that the hopeful lyrics might be an antidote to being "completely pessimistic and cynical about politics and the state of the world." Eno has also said the album is about "paint[ing] a picture of the human trying to survive in an increasingly digital world." Themes of humanity struggling with technology are apparent on several tracks. Top/ Jollification (Epic) was the Lightning Seeds' 1994 album and contains the UK hit singles "Lucky You", "Marvellous", "Change" and "Perfect". Its cover, designed by Mark Farrow, featured the then innovative use of computer graphics to create an enormous strawberry with people's faces as its seeds. The Lightning Seeds are an alternative pop/rock band, largely the brainchild of writer, singer and guitarist Ian Broudie. The group has its origins in the English city of Liverpool, breaking through with the shimmery, psychedelic synth pop hit, "Pure", from the album Cloudcuckooland. More UK Top 20 hits by The Lightning Seeds include a cover version of The Turtles' breathy-trippy 1969 hit "You Showed Me" (written by Byrds members Gene Clark and Roger McGuinn), which was featured in the Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery soundtrack.

Mercedes-Benz by Sonic Nurse

Curated by Music Advisor Max Chavanne of SONIC NURSE | Le Design Sonique for CLM-BBDO advertising, this Mercedes-Benz TV commercial feeds on the track "She's a Rainbow", taken from the 1967 Rolling Stones' psychedelic outing Their Satanic Majesties Request (Decca/ABCKO). Radio commercials curated by SONIC NURSE were also aired by the brand of luxury and high-performance automobiles.

When The Machines Rock

Top/ Technique (Factory Records) is the fifth original album by New Order, released in 1989. Partly recorded on the island of Ibiza, it incorporates balearic and acid house influences into the group's techno-rock sound. New Order were an English musical group formed in 1980 by Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris. New Order were formed in the wake of the demise of their previous group Joy Division, following the suicide of vocalist Ian Curtis. They were soon joined by additional keyboardist Gillian Gilbert. New Order combined post-punk and electronic dance, and became one of the most critically acclaimed and highly influential bands of the 1980s. The band's 1983 hit "Blue Monday" saw them fully embrace dance music and synthesized instruments, and became the best-selling independent 12" single of all time in the UK. New Order were the flagship band for the Manchester based British independent label Factory Records, and their minimalist album sleeves and non-image reflected the label's aesthetics. Like the label 4AD Records, Factory Records used a creative team (most notably record producer Martin Hannett and graphic designer Peter Saville) which gave the label, and the artists recording for it, a particular sound and image. New Order's music has trodden the line between the rock and dance genres, which can be seen on signature tracks such as "True Faith" and "Temptation". They have heavily influenced techno, rock, and pop musicians including Pet Shop Boys, The Killers, and Moby and were themselves influenced by the likes of David Bowie, Neu!, Kraftwerk, Cabaret Voltaire and Giorgio Moroder. They have also significantly influenced electro, freestyle and house. In June 2009, it was announced that Bernard Sumner had formed Bad Lieutenant, and that they had completed an album, Never Cry Another Tear. Middle/ "World (The Price of Love)" (London Records) was a 1993 single taken from the album Republic, New Order's first album after the demise of Factory Records, and their last for eight years. Bottom/ "Ruined in a Day" was released as the second single from Republic.

That Voodoo That You Do

Material is a musical group formed in 1979 and led by bass guitarist Bill Laswell. Early Material was primarily instrumental. The music was often funky — a few singles, such as "Ciquri", were popular in New York City dance clubs — but decidedly experimental. 1982's One Down marked a change towards relatively more accessible mainstream "funk and disco tunes delivered with a minimum of weirdness." "Memories" was one of Whitney Houston's first recordings as a featured vocalist. Herbie Hancock hired Laswell and many of his Material collaborators for his 1983 album Future Shock, including the important single "Rockit". Laswell has since used the Material name for a variety of projects featuring his usual revolving-door cast of talented musicians. Notable was 1989's Seven Souls, featuring William S. Burroughs reading portions of his novel The Western Lands; that song was also predominantly featured in The Sopranos' season six opener, Members Only. 1993's well-named Hallucination Engine was released on Axiom and features a vast array of guest musicians including Trilok Gurtu, Jonas Hellborg, Zakir Hussain, Bootsy Collins and William Burroughs again, this time on the hilarious track "Words Of Advice".

Toward The Within

Top/ Stratosfear is an electronic music album released in 1976 by the German group Tangerine Dream. It marks the beginning of the band's evolution away from their uncompromising early 1970s synthesizer experiments toward a recognizably more melodic sound, a trend they would pick up again in 1979's Force Majeure. Founded in 1967 by Edgar Froese, Tangerine Dream released this album following 1975's Rubycon and Ricochet. Drummer and composer Klaus Schulze was a member of an early lineup. Tangerine Dream's early "Pink Years" albums had a pivotal role in the development of Krautrock. However, the release of Phaedra in 1974 marked a divergence of that group from Krautrock to a more melodic sequencer-driven sound that was later termed Berlin School. In that same year Klaus Schulze delivered one more LP of pure Krautrock, Blackdance, and began to release more hypnotic versions of what TD was doing.Their "Virgin Years" and later albums became a defining influence in New Age music, although the band themselves dislike the term. Bottom/ EP "Lifeforms" by The Future Sound Of London (Astralwerks, 1994) features the ethereal voice of Cocteau Twins singer Elisabeth Fraser. The Cocteau Twins were a Scottish rock music band active from 1979 to 1997, known for complex instrumentation and atmospheric, nonlyrical vocals. Though formed in the post punk and new wave era, the Cocteau Twins tended to defy concise categorization, and their music was a key influence on dream pop. Although the entire band was praised for their performances, Fraser received the most attention. At times barely decipherable, Fraser seemed to veer into glossolalia and mouth music.

Vortical Phonoteque

Bottom/ Do It! (Domino Records) is the fifth album by the band Clinic, released on 7 April 2008. Clinic are a Liverpool based indie rock band noted for their often fast-paced, eclectic sound. Ade Blackburn's distinctive acidic vocals are a trademark of the band, and they are also known for wearing surgical masks and costumes while performing and in promotional photos. Middle/ Rinôçérôse is a French band founded by Jean-Philippe Freu and Patrice Carrié that mixes rock music and electronic dance music. The duo of musicians also work as psychologists, calling themselves, "Psychologists by day, musicians by night". "Schizophonia" (V2, 2005) marks a new turning point in the band's music, with a more mainstream rock groove rather than a more ambient electronic sound. Included is the single "Bitch". Top/ Taking its cues from soul, funk, hip-hop or 60's pop, In The Mood For Life (Atmosphériques, 2009) is the third album by Wax Tailor. Wax Tailor is the alias of French trip hop/hip hop producer Jean-Christophe Le Saoût. A sweeping, cinematic hip-hop album that had critics citing similarities toDJ Shadow, RJD2 and Portishead, WT's debut album Tales of the Forgotten Melodies (Under Cover, 2005) was heralded as Radio Nova's album of the year. His sophomore effort, Hope & Sorrow was also very well received by audiences. Wax's track "Seize The Day" recorded with Charlotte Savary appears in the soundtrack of the 2008 Cédric Klapisch film Paris. Other musicians who have appeared alongside Wax Tailor include Marina Quaisse, Big Dada rapper Infinite Livez, Alela Diane, North Carolina hip-hop duo The Others, Ursula Rucker, Sharon Jones, Voice and A State Of Mind.