First FSOL track you heard

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Ragnarok
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First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ragnarok »

Thought it might be interesting to see what everyone’s first exposure was to FSOL (though I imagine many of the replies will involve Papua New Guinea)

Back in 95 (when I was 14) I heard the Far out Son of Lung track on the radio, and the presenter saying the end sounded like the Tardis landing.

I remember enjoying the mix of sinister sounds and the groove of the track. I picked up the cassette of the Madman single and really got into it, such a moody EP of dark, funky, trippy music. It was really good to find something different compared to a lot of the chart releases around at the time.

Then I started delving into the other FSOL albums/singles. I didn’t always dig a lot of the ambient stuff finding it sparse and taking too long to get going, but it really grew on me as my appreciation of sound developed…
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Pandemonium »

I've heard Papua New Guinea (around 1995) but didn't know anything about it. No band name, no track name - I just knew that catchy beat.

The FIRST FSOL track I heard and instantly loved was We Have Explosive - it was on THIS compilation :)

- It's one of my favorite FSOL tracks even today - the long-form single is priceless.

After that, I managed to purchase the My Kingdom single, the PNG single and the ISDN album - that was all the store had at the moment. Then I found out PNG is by FSOL, and then the ISDN blew my mind :)
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Ross
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ross »

Had just turned 12, I saw the video for My Kingdom on Top of the Pops (which astounds me to this day - such a commercial TV programme to have a track like My Kingdom on). Even at such a young age I was already interested in anything that stood out as different / interesting, especially instrumental stuff, so it caught my eye and ear.

A few weeks later, I was in the record shop in the town I grew up in, with my mum. I remember saying I was looking for the track, but all I could remember was the band was "Something London". Five seconds later my mum said "Is this it?", having picked up a copy in the ex-chart cassette singles bin she was stood next to. It very quickly became my favourite piece of music (and is to this day), and was a game-changer for me.

One thing that I absolutely loved about it was the sinister feel, particularly that opening breath environment which actually used to scare the shit out of me. As a kid I watched a lot of sci-fi and horror stuff, especially Earth-based things which seemed to be around a lot at the time, particularly on kids' TV. The whole EP really fit the feeling that something sinister was going in the underbelly of the city that I loved in such programmes.

The shop also had copies of the four FSOL albums, which I picked up over the following six months (largely with money stolen from my parents, haha) and then I started asking the shop to order any singles they could get hold of - I spent £8 on an import edition of Cascade, which was a big deal back at that age.
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Pandemonium »

Ross wrote:One thing that I absolutely loved about it was the sinister feel, particularly that opening breath environment which actually used to scare the shit out of me.
Oh hell yes - it was scary for me too, but the good kind of scary :)
I've made dozens of scenarios in my teen head on the My Kingdom [Part 1] sound.
I even wrote about it years later in a student magazine...
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Ross
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ross »

Ha yes, in my head I had an idea of what was making the breathy noise, where it was etc.
Second time I listened to the tape I was alone in the dark and I actually ran out of the room and didn't come back for a few minutes, haha :D
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ragnarok »

Pandemonium, thanks for the link to your incredibly detailed thread! Will have to have a proper read through later

Particularly interesting are the ISDN offcuts you mention. I came across this FSOL promo video from 95:

Are some of the tracks you listed included here?

Ross, I remember the good ol days of ordering FSOL singles into HMV/Virgin stores. That Cascade import was a bit dear wasn't it :)
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by OffLand »

We Have Explosive and Landmass which were on the Wipeout XL (2097) videogame that came out in 1996.
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Dennis »

First thing I saw and heard was what must have been the Teachings from the electronic brain longform 1 hr video on MTV recorded by and watched with a friend around 1997/1998. Completely fascinated I went off the next day and grabbed Dead Cities. Thats where my interest in electronic music began, my background musically up to then was rather guitar-based music, everything connected with 'Techno' was rather like 'meh' to me back those days, so FSOL really opened that door for me (along with Aphex Twin).
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Tito Lozano »

My first was watching Papua New Guinea on Canal+ video mornings at 8.00 before high school, was when i discovered Electronic Music into
my heavy-hard rocker world from children, my first LP or cassette came on 80´s when still have 8-9 years (Van Halen 1&2 and Judas Priest - Sad wings of destiny) but well...Orb-blue room, FSOL Papua were my welcome to the Electronic Jungle, .....so love for all them second middle 90´s artists...Aphex,Underworld,Jeff Mills,Chemicals,Propellerheads,ORB,KLF-2K etcetc.....

That was on 92-3 more or less...but still no into electronic music world, very punk-grunge rocker boy on first 90´s ...was on summer of 94,
when ..other Cobain was dead...1994 ...i listened for the first time ...LIFEFORMS ..into a Rock radio 90´s program,so many fan the MC about Ethno World Rock or Experimental music at the moment...played Lifeforms , his guest Rock starrings OZRIC & FRIPP...and well, since that time Future Sound Of London means for me ...Electronic,Net,Future Music...

http://www.rtve.es/alacarta/audios/prog ... 08/199294/
Welcome to the paradise , Closed now Program from National Radio here....

Rest is part of yours stories about.
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Dennis »

@Tito

So you heard Lifeforms first the year it came out? You're old school maan... :)
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Tito Lozano »

Cheers Dennis, I keep still standing, though barely :)
Still waiting for something say me , leave FSOL and listen to me...........nahhhh :D
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Pandemonium »

Yeah, we've established a few times that we don't really have old-skool fans here on this forum - though Tito may be the exception, seems like most of us got into FSOL in the period between Lifeforms and Dead Cities, even later...

Old skool fans are nowhere to be found today :) and even though we manage fine without them, it would be a busier place for reading...

@Ragnarok - that video is made by Noisesurfer aka Tito Lozano - so he can say best what he mashed-up on that one :) but I don't think it's the ISDN outtakes.
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Ross
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ross »

Way back in the day when the FSOLLIST discussion email list was running it was full of people who'd been into them since Stakker or Papua or whatever. This place is mostly second generation FSOL fans however.
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Tito Lozano »

@Ragnarok : First, welcome to forum chat :)

Well,they were taken from the old flash web back in 2002-3, there came little cuttings lifeforms, the AA Psychedelic manifesto and cuttings..., Mr Pandemonium said the right thing, are Lifeforms extracts (were 5-7 little parts put all together on youtube video), but It has some parts (1 or 2 no more) that are not on lifeforms album, but you can listen those on the Fsoldigital ISDN 94-5 shows and live bootlegs around net/time date released.
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Re: First FSOL track you heard

Post by Ragnarok »

Thanks for clarifying Tito, and nice video!

Am still scouring through Pandemonium's review thread which i'm certainly learning a lot from :)
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