Frequency Variation cover

Frequency Variation

Recorded
Released

This is the earliest music we’ve yet been able to hear by ex-Wire member Bruce Gilbert. It was recorded in 1974, when he was working at Watford School of Art; collaborating with Ron West, Gilbert experimented with oscillators on loan from the Science department, and reel-to-reel tape recorders, to create two primitive audio sculptures. It can feel, at first blush, as more of a historical curio than a listening experience, but give it patience. You can already hear Gilbert’s fondness for patient development and curious systems, and there’s something in the tangle of tones, and the pared-back focus, that means it settled very nicely on the Finnish label Sähkö when finally released in the late ‘90s – after all, Sähkö was the first home for reductionist electronica duo, Pan Sonic.

Jon Dale

Suggestions
Liquid Sunset cover

Liquid Sunset

Paul Bradley
And Then cover

And Then

Colin Potter
Coconut Hotel cover

Coconut Hotel

The Red Krayola
The Days After cover

The Days After

Andrew Chalk, Daisuke Suzuki
Niun Niggung cover

Niun Niggung

Mouse on Mars
Sun Spar cover

Sun Spar

Ulaan Passerine
Cake cover

Cake

Jonathan Coleclough