man hopefully sooner than later i can take a solid adventure through this thread
i've read bits and pieces but have yet to dive in head first
all the youtubes showing the samples are awesome!
my kindgom is surely one of my faves too and it's just so cool to hear where the elements were taken from.
these guys are truly masters of the musical collage
you think about someone like girltalk or whatever and the mashups are as clear as day.....you know everything that went into the tune.
then you look at fsol and for most of thses type songs you wouldn't be the wiser.
yall do such a great job at finding these little 2 second snippets
just awesome stuff....it's like a "making of" for these tunes when you break it down as such
kudos pande!
man a couple of you people here really just go over and above...with your love and devotion. i'm fully impressed and THANKFUL!
ps - pande you better keep cranking through this stuff.....because when mini pande hits the scene......well, you'll see
Yeah I see all my friend with kids - they look exhausted 100% of the time
So I kinda know what to expect when the mini-me hits the scene
And I also want to make these reviews go faster, I'm going as fast as I can,
and I feel kinda spent and out of words right now... until I hit the MPB series I guess I'll feel like I'm repeating myself a little...
Well, I guess that's OK too...
My Kingdom was my introduction to FSOL and Part 1 is my favourite piece of music ever.
As for the cover, I always assumed it is where the 'arms' of the Electronic Brain go... You normally see them punching holes into things, and the bottom of this model looks like they're punching through from somewhere else and coming together.
Part 3 uses one synth sample from Part 1 - I think that's about it. Love that track too, though.
The Future Sound of London - Dead Cities [album] (18-28.10.1996)
Virgin - CDV2814 / CDVX2814 / V2814 / VJCP-25275 / TCV2814 // Astralwerks - ASW 6181
EMI Music Group Australasia // Virgin Music Canada // Electronic Brain Violence
(After many days of struggle to try and start this review, in fear that I'll miss something or it won't be good enough... here we go...)
Well, they certainly reached the pinnacle, or should I say, a bunch of different pinnacles. Dead Cities in one of the most weird masterpieces ever made. FSOL started with Accelerator in 1991 officially entering the world of electronic music, then experimented with aliases and organic ambient with the Tales of Ephidrina, making ambient perfection with Lifeforms. Then they entered more experimental and darker multi-layered style with ISDN (1994/95) culminating with Dead Cities in 1996. Dead Cities has more genres and sub-genres in it than any other album I've heard (and I've heard a lot). The complexity is really off the charts. I've literally never met a music fan, no matter what genre of music the fan was into, that didn't like this album. The quality obviously speaks for itself and I've seen people stand in awe (too many times) listening to this album - rockers, jazzers, punkers, metalheads - it doesn't matter. Of all the 90s albums, if I have to pick a favorite, this will be the one. (sorry Lifeforms... you are the more complete one, but this one speaks more to me...)
Virgin did a good job, again, promoting and releasing this album, making a stunning limited edition (the second picture above) in a cardboard box containing the CD and a 196 pages of artwork, graphics, graffiti, photographs and the semi-crazy rambling paranoid short stories by Garry. The artwork of the album in general is a masterpiece on its own. As usual, the visual product is a collaboration between Buggy G. Riphead, Dougans/Cobain, Olaf Wendt and Vit & Shaueen mostly as models. These are the people who worked on previous projects with FSOL and we already talked about them in detail so if you want to know more about them, dig in the previous reviews.
There are however, two new and very interesting names in the Dead Cities project. Andrea Giacobbe (it's a he, in spite of the name) is an Italian photographer who lived in London at the time and worked in the photo/portrait section of the album. Checkout his website on http://andreagiacobbe.net/ and you will a find an awesome picture in the still section containing Dougans/Cobain/Vit/Shaueen and a pig. Also check out the short film he made in 1996 for the Tracks program. Andrea currently works in Paris.
The other mystical person is Keith Webb, who has an Unknown Contributor Role. But after some digging around, I found out he's an old-skool drummer who worked with lots of acts since the 60s, most notably with Terry Reid and more importantly with Donovan - so there's an interesting connection, Webb probably introduced Donovan into FSOL's lives and Donovan will be an important figure 4 years later on the Isness album. It remains unknown on what tracks exactly Webb contributed drums, but the old-skool live drums snippets are present all over the album.
An interesting video of FSOL delivering Dead Cities to Virgin Records - terrorist style, popped up a few years ago. I wonder what would happen to them is they try something like this today (2013) with all the real terrorist attacks happening... nothing good I guess...
FSOL deliver Dead Cities to Virgin Records
So FSOL delivered the demo in May, and it took 4 month to pack, create and deliver the final package. Also not to forget that the end sample (post the Dead Cities hidden track -i.e. the very last sounds of the album) is the bit from 2:25 (ish) of that delivery video. Another proof that the demo was not complete and/or we have some sort of time-travel happening.
Another video promoting on MTV in mid-July (back in the days when MTV meant something to the music world) was the Teachings from The Electronic Brain, a 38 minute film of connected video material for the half of the Dead Cities tracks. The CGI was spot-on for the time, but this remained just a promo and was never released, like most of FSOL's video projects.
FSOL - Teachings from The Electronic Brain
People who followed the FSOL releases, as well as the average electronic music fan at the time, would easily notice the insane complexity of this album, especially the b-side. Insane being the key-word here, (maybe insane is a little too strong of a word and doesn't describe the exact situation of the things), but when I read the paranoid stories of the limited edition and listen to the album, I can not escape the feeling that the duo went a little overboard with experimental drugs (still in a good way though) and the pressure was building up on them with the fame and the expectations and Virgin and all that shit - you can really feel these things in the album. Gary, being the more outspoken and emotional half, always being the front, was finally sick of it. Brian being the back-end silent one, probably never wanted this pressure in the first place. Brian and Garry were 29/31 years old at the time. They will go on like this for another 8 months or so, until taking the big break of almost 4 full years.
So you take the album in your hands, you get psyched with the scary portrait, turn it over, get confused by the tracklist, and in this scratching your head condition you press play in track 1: (The tracklist looks totally confusing, the album actually has 16 tracks even though the CD reads only 13. Tracks 9, 12 and 13 contain 2 tracks each and should be divided as explained below. )
01. Herd Killing (2:36)
- The weird opening of the futuristic urban decay makes you understand the cover a bit better. The glitchy d'n'b breaks and IDM gets your attention right away. No one at first listen would think that this is connected with track 4 and samples tons of rapping Run-DMC tracks, and the movie Wild at Heart (1990) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100935/). The sounds/noises at 2:06 and 2:27 on the track are taken from Wild at Heart (hear: and )
02. Dead Cities (6:36)
- The opening sample is from Deep Cover (1992) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104073/) Laurence Fishburne as John Hull, "I had killed a man, a man who looked like me" takes you further in the urban madness, with dozens of layers, beats in the front and some weird melodies in the background. The effects are state of the art. Some very nice samples here crying to be discovered... The outro poetry credited to Dick Verbatim, probably an inside joke. The ending with 'make me believe I'm not going to die...' is just pure creepiness.
03. Her Face Forms In Summertime (5:39)
- Finally some slowing down in their known style. Beautiful piece of music. Not much is known about the melodies here, shimmering strings and a beautiful double-bass playing, as well some awesome post-processed drums (Webb, is that you?). Some more uncredited choral vocals... the last minute of the track is a brilliant environmental build-up that takes us to the exploding sounds of:
04. We Have Explosive (6:19)
- The bastard track of FSOL. It can compete with the best tracks of Underworld / The Prodigy / The Chemical Brothers at the time. Well, it was certainly good enough to get me into FSOL, and it will always have a special place in my heart. Brutal stabs, acid, more Run-DMS samples and cyberpunk everywhere. It would be nice to know who sourced the We Have Explosive words here...
05. Everyone In The World Is Doing Something Without Me (4:10)
- As hinted in the My Kingdom single, this developed into a full track on the album, and a beautiful one too. The intro is credited to Craig Armstrong, sourced from an orchestral re-working of Eggshell. WTF? Why was this not released? Armstrong was still infant composer then, but he will make dozens of memorable soundtracks in the years to come, The Space Between Us being my favorite. The opening vocal is by Cobain from 'I need re-calibrate' recorded at The Womb - London. The haunting and beautiful female vocals are sampled from an improvisation by Rebecca Caine. Rebecca Caine is a Canadian opera singer who did the best performance of Les Misérables ever in the 1985 London Cast.
06. My Kingdom (5:46)
- We talked about this masterpiece in the single review here. Samples from Vangelis, Ennio Morricone & Ozric Tentacles - all from the 80s - my most (musically) hated decade inspired my favorite track in the world - the irony... Drums by Richard Thomas, the drummer of Dif Juz, who also worked with The Jesus And Mary Chain and a few other cool bands for 4AD records. Mary Hopkin, the singer sourced from the Blade Runner track by Vangelis, was signed with the Beatles' Apple Records in the late 60s and released a song that became an evergreen, Those Were The Days, an English version of a traditional Russian folk song, originally composed by Boris Fomin.
07. Max (2:49)
- Co-written and named after the piano composer Max Richter, a German-born British composer who also worked with Roni Size. He works with the duo occasionally even today (2013). This piece of music is pure emotion. Sometimes I think it's better than My Kingdom. Saxophone played by Richard Thomas, the drummer of My Kingdom.
08. Antique Toy (5:43)
- This is where the B-sides start. Antique Toy reminds me horribly of the Aphex Twin and other IDM/brain-dance colleagues. I also have a feeling that the B-sides of Dead Cities are the first time when the duo used PC software to make sounds. The last two minutes of the track are like a different piece all-together, with voices and environments, and starting at 4:32 we have creepy Predator samples that take me back to Liquid Insects.
09. Quagmire / In A State Of Permanent Abyss (6:57)
09a. Quagmire (5:15)
09b. In A State Of Permanent Abyss (1:42)
- Another intense and creepy piece that uses lots of jazz samples. The discovery of Don Ellis (American jazz composer and a trumpet player who worked with Charles Mingus and other jazz giants) samples form a 1969 movie is pure gold. Original samples collected and collated by Baker St. Mythology. Environment 'He thinks he's very funny' sourced from 'Childhood Memories Of Pin' from the Philip Pin archives. At 5:10, the very end of Quagmire there is a sample taken from 'Flight of The Navigator', a 1986 movie.
- In A State Of Permanent Abyss is another beautiful piano piece from Max. Environment from a lost recording of Max Richter's 'Ripple'.
10. Glass (5:38)
- Just plain weird. Feels like it's inspired/sampled from some child's memories/dreams or a children's show (a weird one). Half-way through the track finally gets the FSOL feel. Some nice unknown saxophone in the back. Again, a minute long environment in the end, with lots of field recordings and the flutes that announce the Yage track.
11. Yage (7:32)
- Finally, the imaginary engineer got a track dedicated to him. Trippy and reminding of the ISDN sessions. Moroccan flute by Yage recorded at sordid accommodation, London, 1989. 'Jane Jane' sourced from Shrine by Riz Maslen, 1983. Riz Maslen aka Neotropic was in some kind of relationship with Brian, I guess in the 1997-2000 period, but let's not get involved in their private lives. Byron Con plays the strings on some ethnic Greek instrument. His full name is Byron Contostavlos, a British bassist with Greek origins. Leon Mar aka Noel Mar aka Oil also contributes to the track.
12. Vit Drowning / Through Your Gills I Breathe (5:32)
12a. Vit Drowning (4:49)
12b. Through Your Gills I Breathe (0:43)
- One of the most beautiful tracks on the album. Not that it stands out much above the others, the whole album is tight as fuck, but the small shades of differences can be spotted after listening the album for a thousand times. Spooky keyboards, slow acid wobbles and millions of effects. Vit already got a track dedicated to him on Lifeforms, this one is dedicated to the shooting of the Far-Out Son VHS when he nearly drowned for real during the shooting, or at least that's the story. Through Your Gills I Breathe is a short 43 second piano piece that I really really can't describe how good it is.
13. First Death In The Family (4:45)
13a. First Death In The Family (2:19)
13b. one minute silence
13c. Headstone Lane - Dead Cities (Reprise) (1:30)
- A proper title and ominous music for the closing track. Recorded and performed on an unscheduled Baker St/Dollis Hill day trip by Brian. The hidden track in the end is performed by Simon Wells aka Headstone Lane, who will (like Leon Mar aka Oil) also release a mini-album for the short lived EBV records. The track is a proper punk record manipulated by Wells, maybe an homage to Exploited's Dead Cities ( The end sample, the very last sounds of the album - is the bit from 2:25 (ish) of the delivery video. Time-travel...?
And now... you know the drill... to the sample library!
Herd Killing (at 0:16) samples the opening of Nierika by Dead Can Dance (4AD, 1996) - this album came out only 4 months before Dead Cities! (possible hoax sample??)
Herd Killing (at 0:28) & We Have Explosive (at 0:17) sample Tougher Than Leather (at 3:48) by Run-DMC (Profile, 1988)
Herd Killing (at 0:36) samples Soul To Rock & Roll (at 2:14) by Run-DMC (Profile, 1988)
Herd Killing (at 1:43) & We Have Explosive (at 3:58) sample I'm Not Going Out Like That (at 0:02) by Run-DMC (Profile, 1988)
We Have Explosive (at 0:48) samples Hit It Run (at 0:11) by Run-DMC (Profile, 1986)
My Kingdom samples explained when I reviewed the single here.
Quagmire (at 1:33) samples trumpets from Moon Zero Two (at 1:19:14), a 1969 soundtrack by Don Ellis
Quagmire (at 1:09) samples the drum-break from Santana - Soul Sacrifice (at 5:25), from the 1977 album Moonflower.
Quagmire (at 5:10) has a sample taken from 'Flight of The Navigator', a 1986 movie.
- There are dozens of other samples in this album that remain unknown, making this the least sample-discovered album form the 90s era, but I hope some day we'll dig out most of them.
Appendix B: other spectacular electronic (and such) albums that came out in 1996 (just to feel out the surroundings):
- Orbital - In Sides
- Underworld - Second Toughest in The Infants
- Aphex Twin - Richard D. James Album
- Richie Hawtin's Concept 1 - 96-06
- LFO - Advance
- The Black Dog - Music for Adverts (And Short Films)
- Squarepusher - Feed Me Weird Things
- 808 State - Don Solaris + Thermo Kings
- B12 - Time Tourist
- Josh Wink - Left Above The Clouds
- Jeff Mills - Purpose Maker Compilation
- Daft Punk - Homework
- Fatboy Slim - Better Living Through Chemistry
- Two Lone Swordsmen - The Fifth Mission (Return to The Flightpath Estate) + Swimming Not Skimming
- Afrika Bambaataa & Time Zone - Warlocks and Witches, Computer Chips, Microchips and You
- Richard H. Kirk - Agents with False Memories
- Tricky - Nearly God + Pre-Millennium Tension
- Herbert - 100 Lbs
- Luke Vibert aka Plug - Drum'n'Bass for Papa
- Sneaker Pimps - Becoming X
- Lamb - Lamb
- Howie B - Music for Babies
- Faithless - Reverence
- DJ Spooky - Songs of a Dead Dreamer
- DJ Shadow - Endtroducing...
- DJ Food - Refried Food
- Beastie Boys - The In Sound from Way Out!
- Vidna Obmana - The River of Appearance
- Steve Roach - The Magnificent Void
- Glass / Bowie / Eno - Heroes Symphony
- Tetsu Inoue - World Receiver
- The Orb - Auntie Aubrey's Excursions Beyond The Call of Duty
- Spacetime Continuum - Emit Ecaps
- Neotropic - 15 Levels of Magnification
- Jedi Knights - New School Science
- Boards of Canada - Hi Scores + Boc Maxima
- Bill Laswell's Sacred System, Chapter One (Book of Entrance)
- Bill Laswell's Equations of Eternity - Equations of Eternity
- Bill Laswell's Arcana - The Last Wave
- Bill Laswell - Ambient Compendium
- L.S.G. - Vol.2
- The Art of Noise - The Drum & Bass Collection
- Moby - Little Idiot + Animal Rights
I probably forgot some legendary albums, but that is a pretty impressive list!
Last edited by Pandemonium on Thu May 25, 2017 12:20 am, edited 10 times in total.
Pandemonium wrote:I've literally never met a music fan, no matter what genre of music the fan was into, that didn't like this album.
Well, there is one. I don't like this album. The only good tracks on it are Herd Killing, We Have Explosive, Yage and My Kingdom. Every other track is boring as hell, especially 'Everyone in the World...'.
I really don't like it.
Last edited by Codringher on Fri Sep 27, 2013 9:29 am, edited 1 time in total.
Pandemonium wrote:
13c. Headstone Lane - Dead Cities (Reprise) (1:30)
- A proper title and ominous music for the closing track. Recorded and performed on an unscheduled Baker St/Dollis Hill day trip by Brian. The hidden track in the end is performed by Simon Wells aka Headstone Lane, who will (like Leon Mar aka Oil) also release a mini-album for the short lived EBV records. The track is a proper punk record manipulated by Wells, maybe an homage to Exploited's Dead Cities
Great writeup man (as always) !
Also not forgetting that the end sample (post the Dead Cities hidden track -i.e. the very last sounds of the album) is the bit from 2:25 (ish) of that delivery video.
Pandemonium wrote:
The other mystical person is Keith Webb, who has an Unknown Contributor Role. But after some digging around, I found out he's an old-skool drummer who worked with lots of acts since the 60s, most notably with Terry Reid and more importantly with Donovan - so there's an interesting connection, Webb probably introduced Donovan into FSOL's lives and Donovan will be an important figure 4 years later on the Isness album. It remains unknown on what tracks exactly Webb contributed drums, but the old-skool live drums snippets are present all over the album.
Keith Webb works for Freedom and was probably their manager at the time.
The outro poetry credited to Dick Verbatim, probably an inside joke.
Indeed, it's by Gaz. Some pretty good words too.
WTF? Why was this not released?
Can't find it now, but in an interview Gaz said something like they were heading too far into kind of standard/accepted mainstream, doing orchestral versions of their tracks etc. - they wanted to remain vital and different.
Riz Maslen aka Neotropic will become Brian's wife some 10 years after Dead Cities. As far as I know they're still together with kids and everything - maybe some UK fan has more trivia info on this...
No idea when they broke up, but Riz definitely isn't Brian's wife. She still lives in East London and obviously maintains links with the band.
The track is a proper punk record manipulated by Wells, maybe an homage to Exploited's Dead Cities
I thought/assumed Brian was married or partner to Lysa Barlett - the lady who did the artwork for the Yage Woodland of Old album, MPB podcast covers, Paul Weller hand/remix RSD cover, and Neotropic's White Rabbit cover.
Could be wrong of course, and probably none of our business!
It has to be said, Dead Cities and all the releases associated with it is like an infinite universe of material and references. No wonder they stepped away after its release.
Yes, she and Dianne are thanked with love in the credits of one of the MPB - Dianne Harris being Gaz's partner who runs the Kinetica Gallery. No idea if they're married or just partners or what - but as Dell says, no need to pry too closely! I really love her artwork.
Cool stuff, and thanks for linking to that site with the photograph of the guys at that time. Anyone knows what's the deal with the pig in many of the photographs in the (limited edition) booklet art? I believe you can also hear some pigs squeel at the end of "We Have Explosive" I for one think they're very interesting and cute animals (and don't eat them).
RazorJack wrote:I for one think they're very interesting and cute animals (and don't eat them).
I agree, but I must say I do eat them - and they're my favorite kind of meat.
FSOL seem to be very impressed with pigs also,
pigs being the closest animal to the human kind (in character, not genetics)
Vertical Pig in Lifeforms - the term vertical pig is used for people.
Pigs squeal are present in Dead Cities on a few places...
