If you could own only 3 Ambient albums...

Oct 23, 2008 at 3:34 AM Post #16 of 60
If you're talking about ambient music in general (i.e. not restricted to music with beats), my choice will be

Jon Mark - Standing Stones of Callanish (most people will regard this album as Celtic music instead of ambient, but ambient it surely is)

Robert Rich - A Troubled Resting Place

Harold Budd and Brian Eno - The Plateaux of Mirror

I know nothing about Ambient Dub/House/Techno at all, I like the following albums although I'm not sure they qualify:

The Orb - Orblivion
808 State - Ex:el
Hana - Omen
 
Oct 23, 2008 at 4:13 AM Post #17 of 60
Aloof Proof - Expo Two (piano text) [my personal favorite ambient album at the moment]
Julien Neto - Le Fumeur de Ciel
Steve Roach-Structures From Silence C

Brian Eno - Ambient 1 (essential in any ambient collection)
Harold Budd & Eraldo Bernocchi - Music for Fragments From the Inside
 
Oct 23, 2008 at 6:26 PM Post #18 of 60
Some great suggestions in here!
Definitely going to check some of them out...
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Oct 23, 2008 at 8:07 PM Post #20 of 60
Wow, just three? Tough... Well then, in no particular order:

Deathprod: Morals and Dogmas
Andrew Chalk: Shadows from the Album Skies
Matthias Grassow: Deeper Purity

May I round this off as a top 5?

Oophoi: The Spirals of Time
Polmo Polpo: The Science of Breath

How about a top 10?

Tetsu Inoue: Ambient Otaku
Stars of the Lid: Stars of the Lid and Their Refinement of the Decline
Cold Sun: Ambientology (FREE!!! At the Internet Archive as are all his albums)
Windy & Carl: Akimatsuri
Brian Eno: Ambient 1


Looking over my list above, I'd have to say the three I posted first are truly my favourite and I listen to one of them at least once a day. This may be true of others in the top ten but those three definitely get spun the most. That said, I think for myself I'd rather something like:

If you could only listen to three ambient artists who would they be?

Then I would choose:

Deathprod
Windy & Carl
Matthias Grassow

If only because they have a good amount of material out there. If I were really smart, replace the first two with Brian Eno and Oophoi then I'd have about 100 albums I could listen to
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Oct 23, 2008 at 8:15 PM Post #21 of 60
Been a silent observer of this thread now. Quite some awesome recommendations. This is my first foray into ambient territory, and me liking it.
Stuff I found awesome was Global Communication, Biopsphere - Substrata, Ishq - Orchid
Anyone heard Monolake? Hongkong is a good album
Also, what genres does Tangerine Dream and Ozric Tentacles fall under?
 
Oct 23, 2008 at 8:24 PM Post #22 of 60
Quote:

Originally Posted by RationalGaze /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Anyone heard Monolake? Hongkong is a good album
Also, what genres does Tangerine Dream and Ozric Tentacles fall under?



I've never heard Ozric Tentacles but Tangerine Dream is often categorized as ambient. Certainly they are a pioneer in synthetic sonic landscapes and flowing tunes.
 
Oct 24, 2008 at 10:06 PM Post #23 of 60
match sticks (from aphex twin - selected ambient works 2) always makes me think of some apocalypse aftermath, the second half of dead cities by FSOL (after the techno) is quite moving, sarotti (off sunelectric's kitchen) is a classic ambient building into techno & back down again, the orb u.f.orb i find quite magical!

all old stuff but it's what i would call ambient techno & judge other stuff by. but isn't it called minimal techno nowadays?

gawd i feel old
 
Oct 24, 2008 at 10:10 PM Post #24 of 60
If I could only own 3 ambient albums...

Desiderii Marginis ~ Deadbeat
Atrium Carceri ~ Ptahil
Raison d'Etre ~ Metamorphyses
 
Oct 25, 2008 at 11:29 AM Post #25 of 60
Hannu - "Worms in my piano" excellent minimal work from a new Finnish artist. I saw the cover art and I knew this is the album I love.
Also, Japan ambient/minimal label SPEKK has some wonderful ambient/experimental releases. I keep four of them - "John Hudak - Room with sky", "Andrey Kiritchenko - True Delusion", "VA - Small melodies", "Boca Raton - Enzo/Further". Neither of them ever let me down.
 
Oct 25, 2008 at 4:15 PM Post #26 of 60
There would be Brian Eno, that's one thing for sure. My favorite these days, the one that I have always gone back to over and over is On Land. It has pretty much everything that I like, it's relaxing, but at the same time it's interesting, and even captivating. One listen to the closer "Dunwich Beach, Autumn, 1960" was enough to make it my favorite ambient album. And that song title evokes a near perfect feel for the sound. If you ever see copies for a decent price, grab the Eno boxes, one vocal and one instrumental, each with 3 CDs full of great music.

And Harold Budd, many great albums, some of them already mentioned, and there was at least one great thread here in the past when we were discussing the new (at the time) Avalon Sutra, but none that I love more than The Pearl with Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois. Beautiful record. Truly hypnotic.

And more recently, from sometime in the mid 90s, Stalker by Robert Rich and B. Lustmord. Stark and beautiful, but also very dark and desolate. Amazing texture to the landscape.
 
Oct 26, 2008 at 8:30 AM Post #27 of 60
Too difficult to answer because almost anything I listen to have the ambient and atmospheric element in it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by synaesthetic /img/forum/go_quote.gif
If I could only own 3 ambient albums...

Desiderii Marginis ~ Deadbeat
Atrium Carceri ~ Ptahil
Raison d'Etre ~ Metamorphyses



I've seen some of the band names you mentioned in the past and I'm repeatly impressed with your taste.
 
Jan 19, 2009 at 6:05 PM Post #30 of 60
I'd save my 3 wishes for another Genie, perhaps the jazz or blues Genie.

Interesting thread, though. I wish I knew more about this kind of music. From what little I've heard of the stuff mentioned here, I've been impressed and quite relaxed.
 

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