My Kingdom re-imagined / Isness - Record Store Day release

[Ross]

100 Baby Spiders is actually a very early Dead Cities track from late '95.

The sessions for what would have been LP5 began in late '96 and brought about Shining Path (Sendoro Luminoso and Peel Session versions), Tudor Oak (Exchanged), Thinking About Thinking About Thinking (Private Psyche and Inner Life), Trying to Make Impermanent Things Permanent, Popadom, Headhunter, plus unreleased tracks East Pacifica, How to Be a Genuine Fake and very early versions of what eventually became Chawawah, Theram, The Peppermint Tree and Indian Swing. It was long assumed that Glacier was also planned for the album, but it has its roots in Glass (hence the title). One of the two versions on Environments 2 is actually a remix by Max Richter (hence his name in the credits), although I don't know which version. I Turn to Face the Sun was updated in recent years, I believe the 1997 version is a slightly different mix. Apparently they were both big fans of the track, even after they'd turned away from the Dead Cities sound, which is actually why it was chosen as the third single - but by this point they were already knee-deep in psychedelia and Gaz in particular wanted to leave it behind.

The first part of Glacier seems to be about the same length as it appeared on the promo, so i would assume the second part is the remix. I've never heard the version on the promo, so I'm just guessing.

Quite a mixed bag seems to have come from those sessions and some of the tracks I'm either not that keen on or I just feel aren't strong enough to be on an album. So probably better an actual album never came from it. Also the previous 3 albums were deeply set in a particular concept, so I wonder if that possible follow up would even have had one based on that list. Which is probably how they ended up just picking out the psychedelic rock stuff and eventually arrived at The Isness.

[Ross]

What promo is that?

Yes, if they'd ever made a FSOL album out of that material it would have been very different to what had come before. Lots of guitars and organs and breakbeats, I reckon it probably would have been really commercially successful in that Prodigy/Chemical Brothers era. But it would have been far less atmospheric and ambient than anything they'd done since Accelerator so I'm not sure how it'd stand up to the later stuff. I doubt it could have happened though - like you say, not all of that material is necessarily album standard, and knowing what their previous workrate is like they would have recorded twice as much again before finishing another album, and after that much material they were deep into full on Isness mode. If it were another band, we'd probably have got an EP of some of that material in 1998, but judging on the Archives series it's pretty clear that FSOL have absolutely no problem leaving excellent material unreleased.

Glacier is listed on this promo version of the ISDN show CD as part of a bonus mix - https://www.discogs.com/The-Future-Soun ... se/4966827

I agree the breakbeat/big beat sound would have fitted very well at the time, but wouldn't have aged anywhere near as well as their other albums. Now it would be like listening to some of those other albums by artists released in the late nineties, like Lunatic Calm, only for the genre to have long died out and the music itself sounding very dated.

[Ross]

Glacier is listed on this promo version of the ISDN show CD as part of a bonus mix - https://www.discogs.com/The-Future-Soun ... se/4966827

Oh, that's a bootleg made by board member Tito Lozano. Those last three tracks are the Mixing It '97 set, which features is basically Sendoro Luminoso, A Sweltering Heat (with vocal sample), Glacier Part 2 and Exploded Funk.

Yeah it looks like a home made job. I've just noticed it doesn't have a date too. Is the Mixing It '97 mix by FSOL in 1997 or is it by Tito Lozano and done much later?

[mcbpete]

Indeed this is exactly the danger of bootlegs (esp. those that hit discogs) ... they tend to confuse everything! The Mixing It '97 mix is dated 25th March '97 though - full details here: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=546#p6084

Yes I wish Discogs would edit these off. But good to know it was done in 97. Cheers.

[Ross]

All you need to look for on Discogs is the 'Unofficial' tag in the release format section. Mixing It was one of three sessions they did in 1997 showcasing new material before disappearing for a long time.

[Ross]

Two bonus tracks on CD edition due 24th May

1. My Kingdom - Path 7
2. Transient Empires
3. Collapsed Structures
4. Sound Shadow
5. My Kingdom - Path 8
6. Implanted Memores
7. My Kingdom - Path 9
8. Populate
9. Water Garden
10. Old Empire

Brian replied to me on facebook and said yes when i asked if there was going to be a digital version of my kingdom.Will this include the 2 tracks that the cd is getting too Ross?

Thanks

So what about my kingdom path 6 then ? Will it be lost forever

I'm guessing we've already heard path 6 then. It's probably either the Dead Cities version or maybe the ISDN show version or something.

[Ross]

Apparently so. Unless it somehow appears elsewhere in the future.

It's also possible that they forgot the original EP only had five paths and labeled the new paths wrong. Numbers are not an FSOL strength