Humanoid - Built By Humanoid

fsoldigital.com: 2019

After three decades, Brian Dougans felt time was right to dust off the alias that started it all for him. Why such a long gap? Well, he had a little side-hustle called The Future Sound Of London commanding much of his attention, so there's that. Also, I suspect he had lingering harsh feelings over the moniker, the label Westside Records releasing a 'debut' Humanoid record without much of his input involved. He did put out a 'from the archives' item from those sessions on Rephlex, but for the most part seemed content leaving the project in the distant past.

Wouldn't you know it though, that ol' spark of techno inspiration kept nagging at him, eager to try his hand at something more proper acidy and robotic. Can't do much with that in all those FSOL Environments though, lest they muck up whatever psychedelic chill vibes they maintained. Plus, who knows if Garry was even up for such IDM experimentation, his muse often wandering off to parts unknown. No, to truly sate his techno fever, Brian would have to use a completely different alias. Or dust off an old, mothballed one, that'll do too.

A track on a compilation here, a track on a charity collection there, and soon enough, Mr. Dougans had enough material for a new Humanoid album, which in some ways is the real debut. Of course, he hadn't the studio or technology to make anything remotely similar to what's offered on Built By Humanoid way back when, so leave whatever preconceptions of what a Humanoid record should sound like behind, because this ain't it.

Fortunately, Brian doesn't waste your time letting you know what you're in for, opener Orfan Atmosphere three minutes and three seconds (nice) of abrasive glitch-core and acid distortion. Ol' school IDM is back, baby! And as if that session wasn't enough to get your techno-dork on, follow-up Polymath is apparently one of those experimental tracks that uses something called a 'probability theory'. Cool, but mostly sounds like burbly, dubby acid ambient.

That's what the bulk of Built By Humanoid entails: lots of IDM beatcraft, lots of digital acid crunch... the sort of stuff you would expect to have appeared on Rephlex. Is there any of that classic FSOL album narrative though? After a fashion, sure, the track titles suggesting a future dystopia ruled by cybernetic man-apes tweakin' on acid. It's not a touch on Dead Cities' cinematic post-apocalyptica, but then what is?

I feel like there should be more talking points to Built By Humanoid, but without venturing into the weeds of production techniques, there really isn't. Like a lot of Brian's other solo ventures, this sees him pushing a particular sound to a particular limit, the outer edges of sonic styles emanating from the EarthBeat studios. It may be a bit much for those still forlorn for more Stakker acid, but for those willing to hear any ol' indulgence from the FSOL boys, this is a fun record.

The Future Sound Of London - We Have Explosive 2021

fsoldigital.com: 2021

Of course this was up for a modern remix album. Aside from Papua New Guinea, it's possibly FSOL's most well known single. Not that it was their best, oh no. It's just when all of '90s electronic music reached its 'electronica' fever pitch, the blunt, big beat brashness of We Have Explosive made all the rounds of the compilation circuit. One can't help but suspect Brian and Garry made this as stupid-simple as possible, a far cry from all the psychedelic, 'future sounding' music they'd been making since signing with the Mighty Virgin. But hey, the trick worked, We Have Explosive remaining one of their most recognizable productions to this day. Nothing will get you hype speeding down super-sonic racing tracks like hearing those blaring digital alarms and funky guitar licks.

That did have me mulling over a question though: what else can you do with We Have Explosive? Or more importantly, was there anything else I cared to hear? The original and Herd Killing are all I know, and was quite content leaving it at that. Unlike various forms of Cascade and Lifeforms, I've never heard alternates of We Have Explosive floating about, leading me to conclude all that was ever needed out of it was accomplished with the album variants, the extended takes unnecessary to all but completists. And given the FSOL boys have long been uninterested in returning to boshy dance music, there didn't seem much room for further exploration of the track. Still, that doesn't mean they wouldn't give it the ol' London college try.

The original kicks things off, and though given a little extra production beef and flair, it's basically as you remember it in the years 1996 and 1997. Ah, the memories of that utterly bizarre music video with the bobble heads and plugs come rushing back. Implosive, meanwhile, takes things into rockier pastures – or psych-rock in this case, followed upon by a heavy, trip-hop take with Abandoned Housing Blocks Of Prypiat. Jonesing for something more experimental and modern? Tracks like Vaporise and Slide Door will have you covered, all skittery broken beats and minimalist soundscapes – almost sounds like they'd be more at home on an Environments CD.

Okay, so FSOL can take We Have Explosive into some nifty tangents, but c'mon, let's hear some real kick-ass stuff, mates! Detonation basically chops and screws everything up into a funky freak-out, Herd Killing is also given the 2021 're-beefening' treatment, Exploding ramps things up into drum 'n' bass territory, and Exotype... Holy shit, this is some menacing-as-fuck frantic breakcore shite! Ah, the 'what if' possibilities of FSOL going full IDM, eh?

A few more sampledelic groovers round out the rest, including Waiting Your Return, which borrows more from Vit Drowning and Through Your Gills I Breathe than We Have Explosive. Ah sweet, those are some of my favourite 'deep cuts' out of the classic FSOL catalogue. Well played, good sirs, you've given me more than I'd hoped for.

The Future Sound Of London - The Pulse EPs

Jumpin' & Pumpin': 2008

This has to be about it. There can't be anymore long-lost FSOL releases from way back that I haven't gotten. Officially released ones, at least. Like, there's still all that From The Archives material that they never seem to run out of, though I'm sure whatever was still in their ancient data banks has been expunged by now. No, wait, I'm seeing a recently released EP called Mental Cube (Original Recordings From 1990). Oof, of course there would be something like this floating about. And I suppose they could still gather up all their wayward single-purpose aliases into a compilation at some point. Aliases like Metropolis, Semi Real, Intelligent Communication, Art Science Technology, and Homeboy (2). Brian and Garry really were quite the busy-bodies back-when.

But no, I'm talking about straight-up, proper Future Sound Of London works, of which The Pulse EPs was where they first emerged. Indo Tribe too, if we're keeping count. And Smart Systems as well. Technically also Yage, as an artist and not a producer. Mental Cube though, that had already been around. Basically Garry and Brian finally just putting themselves and their Earthbeat sessions out there, seeing what stuck and what would be relegated to the dustbin of early rave jams. Four records emerged from this series, with a spiffy consolidation of them released when the duo were re-releasing a bunch of archival material on the 'net.

Things kicks off with, appropriately, Bring In The Pulse (MFK Mix), as Indo Tribe. Though Lord Discogs tells me this is the first instance of me having this track, it sure feels like I've already heard it, a fairly standard breakbeat-bleep track as heard out of the early UK rave scene. Maybe a lot of it was recycled into other tracks? Whatever, the first real item of note on the first Pulse EP is the first official FSOL track, which appeared nowhere else: Hardhead (Frothin' At The Mouth Mix)! It's... um... it's not like any other FSOL track you'll hear, just a rudimentary breakbeat tune with some sample play, a standard hook, and a freakin' rave whistle. Wow, and to think this alias would lead to such wonders as Cascade and My Kingdom. More representative is Pulse State, the groovy acid house number as heard on Accelerator.

Yeah, there isn't much else on The Pulse EPs that I haven't talked elsewhere, only two more tracks unique to this release within my collection. Mental Cube's I'm Not Gonna Let You Do It is a nice, simple, retro-future techno jam, but Smart System's Zip Code is little more than a standard rave bosher. Still, I love hearing Calcium again, even if in slightly edited form. In fact, there's a lot of 'slight edits' on here, a consequence of cramming four EPs onto a single CD. I think this is a better overall compilation of early FSOL material compared to Earthbeat, but it's not the whole story, and with a quarter of it re-appearing on Accelerator, a bit redundant to completists.

FSOL - Music From Calendars

fsoldigital.com: 2021

So, you think you're a hardcore Future Sound Of London fan? Got all their classic '90s albums, do ya'? Pft, that's not even scratching the surface. Side project stuff then, like Amorphous Androgynous, Humanoid, and all those early Earthbeat records. Not even close to a completist. Ah, you kept connected with all their 21st Century albums then, the Environments series, more AA prog-rock, even that Blackhill Transmitter thing. No, wait, the entirety of From The Archives too! That's pretty hardcore, no doubt, but still not propah' FSOL 'ardcore. Well shit, son-of-lung, what else is there? The soundtracks for films that no one saw (Four Forests) or don't exist (The Cartel)? Getting warmer...

If you consider yourself a true, bells-and-all hardcore FSOL fan, you've subscribed to their Calendar series. Once a month, the lads send a new tune, usually as their main nomme de plume, but under different aliases as well. It's a series that's been ongoing for half a decade now, and a handy way of keeping up to speed on the goings-on at EBv.

Obviously, I'm not that hardcore of a FSOL fan, since I never subscribed to this series. Nor did I much care to indulge the yearly summation compilations either. Look, when I can't even be bothered to get any of the Archives material, you're damned skippy I haven't the care to hear whatever random sonic studio doodles Brain and Garry squirt out a given month. Now, a gathering of all the choice material from a four year time-span, that's the ticket!

If you have been keeping up with your recent FSOL output, much of Music From Calendars 2017-2020 will be familiar territory. The weird, psychedelic abstraction (Frozen Air, Blacked Out Windows, Memories Of A Yesterday), the future-shock electro (Near Field, Obscured By Dark Intervals), the primordial chill (Artificial Placement Of Emotion, Commensalism, Riverbeds), the... throwback Earthbeat techno? Oh, wow, Alertions certainly is a surprise. Guess they made this just to show if they wanted to make something danceable, they're still more than capable of.

It's not a total FSOL love-in, a couple side-projects getting a side-glance in. Second track Surrounding The Garden Is A Fog comes from Synthi A, a deliberate throw-back to the days of '70s synth wizards. It's one of their more recent projects, conceiving only one album in 2016, plus a couple Calendars tracks. That this piece was considered among their best recent works is, not that surprising, to be honest. For '70s synth wibbly-warbly stuff (think Tomita or Schulze), it's rather nice. The other 'non-FSOL, but is still FSOL' track is Propogate from Humanoid. It definitely shows off Brian's love affair with the more techno-y side of IDM, but seems more fascinated with experimentation for its own sake.

Overall, Music From Calendars runs a tidy fifty minutes, and flows nicely from beginning to end. It still doesn't come off much more than a glorified sampler of FSOL music, but then we've been enjoying those since ISDN, haven't we?

FSOL - ISDN

Virgin: 1995

You'd think I'd have gotten this in my initial gathering of FSOL albums, a necessary companion to Lifeforms and Dead Cities. A few things kept me from doing so though, a primary factor being I wasn't sure this was even an album. Compared to Ziggy Riphead's striking, CGI artwork from this period in Future Sound Of London's timeline, ISDN is flat, drab, and nondescript. Which hey, is an artistic statement in of itself, plus you'd find plenty weirdo visual-scapes within the booklet if you really needed them.

Still, this record had something of a rep, in that even for a FSOL LP, ISDN was way out there. Wherein Brian and Garry, uninhibited by such limitations as 'performance' and 'audience expectation', could transmit their muses directly into your living rooms. Oh honeys, you hadn't heard anything yet. Just wait until you get a load of this thing called 'live streaming'!

That all said, an appreciation of Brain and Garry's numerous Environment outings finally got me to properly grab ISDN. Okay, reconnecting with a few tunes like Slider, Amoeba and A Study Of Six Guitars didn't hurt in nudging me either. Whether this was some over-indulgent live show broadcast over a fledgling internet, or an assemblage of studio wankery, it was hard to deny at least a handful of dope-ass tunes emerged from these sessions. Surely there were more than what I plucked out of ancient P2P programs.

Confounding the “is this a live album or not?” vibe of ISDN is opener Just A Fucking Idiot, sampling live audio from a Joy Division/New Order. From there, the track's pure future-shock territory, so *deep breath* The Far Out Son Of Lung And The Ramblings Of A Madman grounds things with freeform jazz-funk groovy goodness. An appropriately bit of bridging ambience in Appendage later, and we're into the highlights off ISDN: Slider and Smokin Japanese Babe. Yeah, you could argue they're FSOL jumping on some trendy genres (big beat and trip-hop, respectively), but they're still done in that nifty, warped, post-apocalyptic, psychedelic, sampleholic way only FSOL were doing at the time.

After that though, ISDN goes wa-a-a-yy deep into sound collages and music making for its own sake. For sure some moments stick out – the electro-chill of You're Creeping Me Out, the spritely melodies in Eyes Pop – Skin Explodes – Everybody Dead - but it's not until eleventh track Egypt that things steer in some sort of direction again. As for Egypt, it's got electro rhythms, chants, crickets, woodwinds... y'know, vintage Lifeforms-era FSOL.

Kai and Amoeba feel like two halves of a whole, what with their muted rhythm sections, though I prefer Amoeba's sputtering voice pads over Kai's industrial drone-throb. Six Guitars remains pure bliss, and Snake Hips takes us out on total psychedelic rock weirdness. An Amorphous one calls from beyond.

So yeah, ISDN does have some of FSOL's best moments. It's just a shame they mostly come at the bookends of the album rather than as a consistent whole.

Various - EarthBeat

Jumpin' & Pumpin': 1992/2021

Well, this certainly makes that 4-CD Techno Explosion compilation redundant. If you recall my five year old review (!!), I picked it up for exactly one track, Q by Mental Cube. My reasoning was, of the few available options out there, it seemed the most cost-effective. Old pre-FSOL music from Dougans and Cobain was growing pricier on the second-hand market, and no way any of those early collections from Jumpin' & Pumpin' would see a re-issue. So of course they put out a 30th Anniversary release of EarthBeat, the compilation highlighting a bunch of tunes from their early pre-Accelerator catalogue, including Q by Mental Cube. Thanks, Jumpin' & Pumpin'! Or is it fsoldigital that did it? Whoever put it on their Bandcamp page.

In case you haven't kept up with your Future Sound Of London history, Earthbeat is the name of Brian and Dougans' original studio, infamously barely bigger than a working closet lodged between a couple other music gear shops. The lucrative Virgin deal landed them the money to expand, but before their breakout in Papua New Guinea, they mostly used the typical tools of the techno trade of the time: Roland synths and drum machines, Akai samplers, Atari computer, and the like. Small wonder the material released as Mental Cube or Indo Tribe or Smart Systems or Yage wasn't much evolved ('future sounding', if you will) compared to their contemporaries of the time. All they could afford was whatever else everyone else was using, including a few hand-me-downs. Not to mention a little self plagiarism when they finally did a proper album in Accelerator.

With that in mind, going into EarthBeat expecting something mind-bending three decades on is a fool's errand. This compilation is very much a product of its time, techno that you instantly date to three specific years (1990, 1991, 1992), with very little hope of excelling beyond. Yes, Q is one of the few – how many tunes can lay claim to a bunch of bleeping turning into an earworm? Papua New Guinea is also here, but it's the Dumb Child Of Q remix (aka: just the ambient-ish intro), which will never not leave the listener with blue ear-balls. Elsewhere, In The Mind Of A Child is another strong outing for bleep techno, and Tingler's fun for some ol' skool 'ardcore.

As for the rest, they're mostly fine, and certainly show off more diversity than you'd expect from early FSOL: You Took My Love going piano house, People Livin' Today a pure Balearic house outing, Chile Of The Bass Generation repping that Meat Beat Manifesto vibe, the Coby '94 Mix of Stakker Humanoid going full-bore acid techno. If you didn't know better, you might even believe all these aliases were unique artistes on the same label.

The byline on EarthBeat's cover sure suggests so, implicating FSOL, Indo Tribe, Semi Real, Smart Systems, Yage, Mental Cube, Candese, and Humanoid all different. Like, it was some secret knowledge that had to be maintained for all time.

The Future Sound Of London - Cascade 2020

fsoldigital.com: 2020

You knew this was high on FSOL's 'remake classics' list. Cascade already had the distinction of being the first in their 'every single is now a mini-album' manifesto, and it kinda' showed. For all the elements in play with the track proper, Brian and Garry didn't take it down terribly divergent 'paths' compared to later efforts with their EPs. Which is expected, still in a feeling out process of just what they could potentially do with all the new gear they acquired after signing with the mighty Virgin. Brian even says they simply didn't have the technology or know-how at the time to create the sort of music sloshing about in their brains. Still, capital effort in the results, y'know.

Time munches on and hey, wouldn't you know it, technology and know-how finally caught up with ambition, such that FSOL can't stop releasing material if they tried! Having seemingly exhausted their Environments muses for now, it seemed appropriate to revisit some of their back-catalogue, give tunes the sort of care they only dreamed of back in the day (or in the case of Yage, never got the chance in the first place).

If it seemed like I didn't get into the finer details of the original Cascade, it's because I knew there'd be ample opportunity to do so here. The opening track, appropriately enough, is the original track, claiming to be a 'recreation'. It honestly sounds very much like the version as heard on Lifeforms (so sans the little electro bridge two-thirds through), though obviously beefed up in the production department. And yet, I can't help but notice a slight filter on everything too, as though I'm hearing it from another era. Nah, must be some trick on my brain's nostalgia centres, I'm sure.

Now we get into some truly divergent paths, Flood Of Reflection, Deep Sea Of Clouds, and Things That Mattered stripping things down to spare rhythms, subtle pads, and sample collagist works. Meanwhile, Amid The Overwhelm, Dark Hours Of your Being and Sluice get their psychedelic acid stomp on. Elsewhere, techno's pulse can still be felt with Multiple Falling Objects and Brief Silence In The Distance, while What Falls Away Is Always gives the trancey arps of the original's bridge some solo shine. It's funny how such synths almost come off the most dated attribute of Cascade, a relic of the early '90s.

And hey, if you still prefer the older sound of London, we do get some continuation of the original EP, with Part 6 and Part 7 sprinkled about (plus another 'recreation' of the grittier Part 4). Part 6 certainly sounds of that era, an airy rendition that isn't much removed from The Orb's most ambient moments. Part 7 ends Cascade 2020, which really isn't much more than a coda to everything that came before. And hoo, if there wasn't a lot that came before. More than anyone who liked Cascade could probably want, but eh, that's been FSOL's ideology for a while now.

The Future Sound Of London - Cascade

Virgin/Astralwerks: 1993/1996

I do wonder, just how much of a shock this EP was when it dropped. The lads behind Stakker Humanoid and Papua New Guinea going full sample-heavy world beat? Why we never! Yeah, yeah, calling Cascade that is almost blasphemous in some quarters, but let's be real here: 1993 was peak world beat. You already had two juggernauts of that sound making bank across the globe (Enigma and Deep Forest), with many quarters of dance music raiding all manner of sample libraries and fusing them with club rhythms. FSOL, who's omnipresent hit single was no less guilty in doing such, had to feel some pressure to move beyond the association. They had greater artistic aspirations than what rave culture was offering, so time to head back to the lab and start concocting something more evolved from their Earthbeat era (big advance money after signing with the mighty Virgin helped).

Which all seems academic from our lofty vantage point three decades on (holy COW!), but not so much in those short few years of the early '90s. Far as '93 folks knew, FSOL were crafting proper follow-ups to the warehouse techno stompers as heard on Accelerator, not conceptual art music. Oh, that Tales Of Ephidrina thing? Well, they used a different alias for it, Amorphous Androgynous, so clearly it's an album satisfying their expressionist outlet, not a sign of things to come with their most profitable pseudonym. Besides, Tales still had somewhat of a techno pulse, here and there. Nothing to suspect, oh no.

So Cascade drops, the glistening digital rendering of a neuron drawing you in. Glancing at the back cover, you notice something strange for a lead single: it's all in parts, as if one long musical piece. What, were there no remixes commissioned? Not at all, son, marking the start of FSOL handling their singles as nothing less than mini-albums in their own right, demands of clubbing culture be damned.

Still, listening through this EP, and comparing it to where they'd go with future singles, it's apparent Garry and Brian were still in a feeling-out process with this idea. Part 1 is the version most know of (if nothing else than for getting featured in the first Northern Exposure), while Part 2 is mostly the same, just in a slightly extended and dubbier version – so, the Extended Remix. Part 3 goes weirder, sounding like an extended take of sound effects and alien landforms. Why yes, they were already getting the Tangerine Dream comparisons, why do you ask?

Part 4 is where the idea of 'different paths' really takes hold, a harsher, grittier IDM tone prevalent as the base melodic elements contort around gnarly electro basslines. Part 5, meanwhile, edges closer back to the domain of regular techno, surprisingly almost vintage Detroit in execution. Jettisoning most of the 'world beaty' elements (woodwinds, ethnic drumming, etc.), there's still sonic weirdness going on along with sci-fi synths, and man, gotta' love the ol' tikkity-tik-tik drum programming there too.

The Future Sound Of London - Yage 2019

fsoldigital.com: 2019

There had to be an end to all the back-catalogue material FSOL's been churning out for the past fifteen years (holy cow!). After nine volumes of From The Archives, plus six and a half sessions of Environments, it seems Dougans and Cobain are finally moving onto their next venture of future sound creations. And this new phase shall be... remix albums of old singles! Eh? Eh...? Oh c'mon, you know you want it.

As most of their early singles already were remix albums, I wasn't initially sold on the idea. How many more 'paths' could they take these compositions, after all? Turns out, at least a few more, but what initially got me to finally bite was this particular item, Yage 2019.

'Yage' can mean many things, depending how for down the FSOL rabbit-hole you're willing to go. For most it's the pseudonym Cobain and Dougans use as the sound engineer on all their works. Myself, I know it goes way back to their Earthbeat days, where they released an EP as Yage called Fuzzy Logic, and even put out a debut album in 2008 (The Woodlands Of Old). It was with this in mind that I thought we might be in for some additional Yage material on Yage 2019, but no, it's simply a remix album of the tune Yage off Dead Cities. Wait, that never got a single release. What gives?

Not that I want to throw out any wild theories or guesses here, but it wouldn't surprise me if Yage was slotted for EP consideration like My Kingdom and We Have Explosives, but fell through when FSOL's Virgin deal ended. Makes me wonder if any of these new rubs have been idling on harddrives for decades, though I figure such a thing would have appeared on Archives or Environments before-hand.

In any event, if you don't remember Yage, it's that track with the expansive, cascading, shimmering synths, all manner of psychedelic harmonics, clanging sitars, industrial flutes, operatic chants, and that bassline that I can only describe as a heavily manipulated didgeridoo. Basically, a remarkable piece of sample collage that sounds at once primal and futuristic, like discovering an ancient rainforest civilization with space-age technology. Where on earth (and beyond!) can FSOL take this track?

A lot of funky, thrashy, psychedelic places, turns out. Yage 2019 mostly follows a pattern of a more experimental piece followed by a version with mostly familiar sounds from the original, keeping things nicely varied as the album plays out. I can't say every track is a winner, the tune Voodoo Doll seemingly more interested in playing homage to Hendrix rather than maintaining the Yage vibe. And leave it to a Humanoid Rebuild to go as deep in the minimal techno hole as a project like this would allow.

Still, there's plenty of familiar FSOL twists and turns throughout that should interest long-time fans of the duo, even if Yage wasn't the most obvious option for a modern remix album.

Part-Sub-Merged - Four Forests

fsoldigital.com: 2007

Going direct to The Future Sound Of London's website to buy their music is good and all, but what's better are the few items from other artists along with the endless side-projects and alternate aliases. Daniel Pemberton, Neotropic, Ross Baker, and so on. What better way to discover someone new, especially if they come with a FSOL seal of approval! Who to choose, though, who to choose? As is so often the case, I went with my gut instinct, wherein my gut tells me to pick out an item with cover art that somehow resonates with me (often blue). Ah, this here wintry scene of barren trees partially obscured by a frost-encrusted glen fog. Reminds me of so many ambient dronescape releases I've dabbled in. 'Part-Sub-Merged'? Never heard of 'em before, so must be proper obscure. Sounds like a worthy candidate for a blind purchase, I reckon.

The project is obscure, yes, but not the producer behind it, for Part-Sub-Merged is none other than Brian Dougans. You may know him for his early seminal acid house work as Humanoid, or being one-half of psych-rockers Amorphous Androgynous (among other, incidental things). Not that I realized it when I bought it, the digital download offering little in the way of details. It's like, they expected the only folks who'd be interested in this would have already known that FSOL made a DVD movie, and this was the musical tie-in. I didn't though. I just saw an intriguing bit of cover-art in their digital shop, and went in cold-blind. Did make me curious of what this Four Forests film looked like.

Good luck finding that. The DVD was only available through the glitch.tv website, a rather archaic domain of custom FSOL gear and whatnot. A few selected vids can be found on YouTube though, which gives a decent idea of what you're in for. Drives out to the country, wanderings about the forests, a bunch of trippy effects and layered images, all doing that abstract art thing FSOL have been known for since their earliest days. It's interesting enough if the group's visual aesthetic isn't a turnoff, in a Boards Of Canada sort of way.

And speaking of retro music making, the score for this little film is pure '70s weirdness and experimentation, with a touch of the modern production quality thrown in. I'm sure you could squeeze contemporary genre tags into some of these pieces - Slight Movement as trip-hop, Cark as... dub, I guess? Melody isn't high on Brain's mind with this though, most of these tracks short pieces of musique concrete effects most definitely better suited for visual accompaniment. Occasionally something resembling a trippy tune emerges – the creepy bleep of Second Glance, the twee mini-Moog melody of First Breath, the outright psychedelic ambience of Held - but these aren't the norm.

Nothing about Four Forests is normal though. For sure check it out if you're insatiably curious, but this remains one of FSOL's most obscure items, deservedly so.

The Future Sound Of London - Accelerator

Jumpin' & Pumpin'/Hypnotic: 1991/2002

The only Future Sound Of London album you need, if you listen to certain sorts of people. Let's call them 'stuck in The Haçienda' kind of people, UK ravers who never grew beyond that era's acid house scene, will only accept electronic music as it sounded then, and not a month later. Never mind that Brian Dougans and Garry Cobain ventured forth into new, fascinating realms of pure headtrip, mind-fuck album works – it's just not danceable, mate. I sense, though, such folks are forlorn at the coulda'-been, the shoulda'-been of FSOL's potential as studio hounds producing clubbing fodder. They made so many classic, genre-defining tunes at the time, the possibilities of what they might have done after had they scaled back the arty, pretentious aspirations boggles the mind. But nay, the lads from Manchester had grander visions in mind.

And I get it – oh man, do I ever get it. For as much as I've continued enjoying FSOL's work, there's an undeniable addictive simplicity about the tunes on Accelerator that remain effective to this day. Papua New Guinea, obviously, but I've no doubt tracks like the future-shock breaks of Expander, acid-bleep dopeness of Calcium, and blissed-out trancey acid house of Pulse State would be just as effective in any contemporary setting. Hell, I heard 1 In 8 at a music festival this past summer. 1 In 8, one of the 'filler' tracks on this album! Who plays 1 In 8 in this age? A DJ at Basscoast, apparently.

Still, one cannot deny there's some rather dated material on Accelerator too. Despite the smashing opening of Expander (oh, you just know Sasha cribbed that title), Stolen Documents is little more than a peppy transitional track of bleepy sounds and chirpy acid funk. While Others Cry has a little more personality going for it with its Balearic-Jamaican vibe (yes, really), nice for a sway in a hammock or beach lounge. On the other hand though, It's Not My Problem and Moscow have the unenviable task of bookmarking the album centrepiece of Papua New Guinea, and in being such abrasive, boshing tunes, neither are capable of it – you're just waiting for Papua while Problem is playing, and Moscow always feels like a comedown from New Guinea. As for hints at where FSOL would take their music, Central Industrial slows things down and plays up the future-shock scenery full-tilt. Psygnosis Studios were definitely paying attention.

When Accelerator was rolled out for a tenth anniversary re-issue, it included a bonus disc of Papua New Guinea remixes. Most of them take the tune's basic structure and re-purposes them into a particular genre (Satoshi Tomiie does the prog thing, Hybrid do the prog-breaks thing, Oil do the funk-dub thing). The most interesting of the lot are the Simian Mix, where the rock band turns Papua into a bizarre, stoned, jazz-stomp indie hoe-down (I'm sure Gary loved it), and Andrew Weatherall's eleven-minute rub – progressive house of epic proportions, that one!

Various - Techno Explosion (The FSOL Stuff)

Jumpin' & Pumpin': 1997

This is a compilation consisting of four CDs, with fifty tracks spread out across them. I bought this for exactly one track, Q by Mental Cube. It's a surprisingly difficult tune to procure on a physical medium these day. In fact, the original version that appears on here was its last official release, disc or digital. It didn't even get represented on FSOL's recent, early-alias retrospective By Any Other Name. Is Jumpin' & Pumpin' stingy with their rights to their pre-Virgin tunes or something?

Ah, I'll take what I can get. Not that Q is some ultra-rare track, having done the rounds on a few compilations back when it was new. Finding decent prices for CDs like EarthBeat, Breaks, Bass & Bleeps, and Techno Dance Party II is strangely difficult though, so upon spotting Techno Explosion for about half-price, for sure I'll bite. I mean, it's got Q on it, possible one of the greatest bleep-E' tunes ever crafted! Never fails giving me the knackered feels, floating on a good gurn when those strings and singing bleeps get to work.

But an even niftier selling point was the inclusion of so much more old FSOL material. Yage is here! Indo Tribe is here! Humanoid is here! Hell, even some of their most obscure alter egos are here. I guess a whole bunch of other tunes from the Jumpin' & Pumpin' library is a nice bonus, but like Hell I'm gonna' spend four reviews detailing all of it. So, despite the FSOL stuff getting spread out across all four discs, I'll just consolidate that material in this review, and save the rest for a second review. Trust me, it'll only take one to get through.

So what does Techno Explosion offer for pre-Lifeforms tunes? You get a couple tracks that appeared on Accelerator in Pulse State and Innate (aka: 1 In 8). There's also a track called Hard Head, a funky sample-breaks thing that Lord Discogs claims had never been released before appearing on here. Better get on it, completists.

Aside from Q, we also get the Mental Cube dreamy house cut So This Is Love. Hearing Stakker Humanoid again is always fun, a little more bleep action comes care of Indo Tribe's In The Mind Of A Child and I've Become What You Were, and the cuts from Art Science Technology (A.S.T. and Esus Flow) sound like the duo were trying their hand at the rock-influenced Madchester sound. Yage goes experimental tribal (Fuzzy Logic) and ravey house (Livin' For The Love). And, oh dear, are FSOL attempting an 'ardcore track with Space Virus as Smart Systems? Stay in your lane, lads.

While a few from this era undoubtedly retain classic status, they are all quite dated too, nowhere near the amazing production quality of even Accelerator material. Still, compared to what else Jumpin' & Pumpin' was churning out at the time, it's clear the duo was light years beyond their contemporaries even within this limited range of old school techno.

The Future Sound Of London - Environment 6.5

fsoldigital.com: 2016

So Environment Six had its moments, but didn’t gel terribly well as an LP experience. And dammit, is it so unfair of me to want that? The Future Sound Of London made their mark in the ‘90s as one of the few electronic music producers who could successfully release fully-formed albums. We know it’s within Cobain and Dougans’ ability to do so, and though the Environments series has flitted with loose themes thus far, I can’t see an abandonment of it in favor of total freeform music making doing them many favors. With the simultaneous release of 6.5, also featuring a whopping twenty-three tracks, I worried we were in for another lengthy dive into the duo’s erratic muses.

Instead, we’re greeted with one of the biggest opening salvos FSOL have ever committed to record. Axis Of Rotation serves as a brief effects-heavy intro, a suggested orchestral melody emerging. It then melds into a thudding tribal rhythm in Solid Earth, where the same melody plays out in a haunting, subdued fashion. Wait, I should call that melody a leitmotif, because FSOL bring it back way down in track fifteen, The Day The Poles Shifted, and as a grand opus at that. Holy cow, does Environment 6.5 have an honest-to-God concept behind it?

I’d say so. For one, the tracks all flow much better together compared to Six, moments of calm and tranquility explored for stretches before easing along to tunes more brisk and experimental. If a number of these tracks started out as unrelated sonic sketches, FSOL tweaked and twisted them to fit whatever theme holds everything together. Even that, so often vague and obtuse in prior Environments, comes off more concrete than before. For sure explorations of ruined civilizations is well-tread territory where these guys are concerned, but with 6.5, I feel as though I’m directly involved in this musical trek rather than being an outside observer of events. This undoubtedly sounds awfully wanky, but the journey takes you through dark, underground passages, past dwellings both ancient yet futuristic, finally emerging into a new dawn as the surface finally recovers from its cataclysm (by force of nature than anything manmade, it seems).

Individual tracks, then. How do they all come off? Oh, the usual sort of FSOL eclecticism. Anacro Rhythm: far East psychedelia. Opal Light: noir ambient dub. Dark Seed: chipper braindance acid. I Dream In Viral Blue: widescreen jazz-fusion. Ain’t Gonna Lie: far flung ambient techno. Emmissions Of Light: dubby ambient glitch. Strange Allure: pure ambience with bubbling weirdness. There’s more, of course, but gotta’ save some surprises for y’all.

Why this wasn’t the Environment Six Prime album, I haven’t a clue. It’s so much better, Actual Six coming off like the b-side companion an album titled 6.5 should sound like. In fact, I’d rank this one on par with their ‘90s material, if for nothing else than that Axis Of Rotation leitmotif remains stuck in my head. Can’t say the same of most other Environment pieces.

The Future Sound Of London - Environment Six

fsoldigital.com: 2016

It should have marked a triumphant return to electronic music media. Instead, Environment Five, The Future Sound of London’s first full album of original material since the ‘90s, was met with another indifferent shrug. For sure a few of the UK’s more prestigious rags scoped it out, in the process allowing some nostalgic look-backs to groundbreaking rave era Dougans and Corbain material. Having exhausted that angle, however, and FSOL failing to deliver the Instant Modern Classic such folks assumed was in the works, most music journals moved on, Environment Five joining Boards Of Canada’s Tomorrow’s Harvest in the Over-Hyped Return bin (when can we add Random Access Memory to the pile?).

Thus it is with as little fanfare as possible that we return to this series a couple years later. Seriously, I saw no PR leading up to Environment Six, the only hype apparently a Facebook posting. I only found out about it by chance, checking their website for details regarding another side-project, Blackhill Transmitter. Then lo’, there it was, not one, but two new Environment albums. Well geez, better snatch those up post-haste. Surely folks will be buzzing about these soon enough (nope).

At twenty-three tracks, Environment Six looks daunting, but less than half of these break the three-minute mark, only one passing six minutes. Not that this is anything new, FSOL long known for their sonic doodles and half-formed musical ideas, such pieces serving as interludes, transitionals, or experimental indulgences that could never form Proper Tunes. And we generally allow it as they often serve a greater thematic whole within the context of their albums. Even these Environments, as loosely defined as they are, still adhere to some conceptual structure. This one though, I dunno – there’s more random meandering than ever here.

It starts out fine enough, the first few tracks reasonable lengths and exploring the usual future sounds Cobain and Dougans so often do - Polarize does the epic post-apocalypse thing, Mountain Path a meditative ambient thing, Thought Pattern a minimalist ambient techno thing. Elsewhere, Lichaen takes the tried-and-tested psychedelia path, Sol 7 goes all dubby glitch, Symphony For Halia provides a haunting, static-dub vibe straight out of Ultimae’s textbook, Plausibility opts for pure orchestral psychedelia, Yut Moik comes off like a long-lost track from Warp’s Artificial Intelligence series, and Leak Stereo 70 does a brisk, micro future-funk jam.

A nifty assortment of FSOL tunes, all said, though little thematically linking them together. Matters aren’t helped that tons of disjointed sonic doodles are littered amongst as individual tracks, seldom letting anything stick in your brain before quickly moving onto the next wayward muse FSOL follows. An ultra-short synth-arp tease in Seq/-9 is especially egregious. The final couple tracks - Meanders and Solace - are decent closers, but fail to sum Environment Six in any meaningful way. I don’t have much problem with ‘music for its own sake’, but it’s nice having some cohesive reason to sit down and take a full album in.

ACE TRACKS: November 2012

We’re nearly at the end of these back-tracking ACE TRACKS Playlists. It’s weird realizing that the music I was playing and reviews I was writing was done over three years ago now, enough time that I’m actually having faded recollection of the month. Like, as though it was a distant part of my past, not unlike my TranceCritic writing days. The music I was covering seems so innocent too, still going through my old collection of trusty favorites and stand-bys, having no clue of the splurging I’d undertake that’d bloat out my library to the four digit realm. About a dozen CDs have since been added within this block alone, and that’s just narrowly missing out that Pete Namlook tribute box set. Back then I had no idea labels like Silent Season, Altar, or Psychonavigation even existed! That November also marked the point I realized I could keep writing at a near-daily clip, though with a signficant chunk being some of my all-time favorite albums, it’s not surprising I was feeling the mojo then. It’s also a big ol’ ACE TRACKS Playlist, so let’s get to ‘er.


Full track list here.

MISSING ALBUMS:
Pete Namlook - The Definitive Ambient Collection: Volume 2
Deep Forest - Deep Forest
Dillinja - Cybotron
Djen Ajakan Shean - Crows Heading For Point Break
Roc Raida - Crossfaderz: A Turntablist’s Throwdown!!
Quadrophonia - Cozmic Jam

Percentage Of Hip-Hop: 12%
Percentage Of Rock: 19%
Most “WTF?” Track: Fear Factory - Pisschrist (that title, tho’!)

Full albums from Future Sound Of London, Pink Floyd, and Spicelab are a must. A bunch of Fear Factory, a pile of progressive trance, a little techno, psy, and world beat thrown in for good measure. Oh, and that last little bit of Bone Thugs working its way in too. Man, did I ever look like the Bone Thugs fanboy in those early months. Little did anyone know my hip-hop allegiance lay with the Wu-Tang Clan (plus whatever Del was up to). All in all, this is a fun, varied month’s worth of music, another reason why I likely sped through those CDs so fast. Couldn’t wait to hear the next one again!

The Future Sound Of London - Environment Five

fsoldigital.com: 2014

Considering the seemingly endless volumes of From The Archives and, to a lesser extent, Environments, The Future Sound Of London must have had shed-fulls of unused material stored. At least with Environments, they gradually sprinkled in some new stuff too, helping create distinctive album narratives between each edition. And now finally - finally - Dougans and Cobain either found enough inspiration to craft an entirely new album of fresh music under the FSOL banner, or they've used up their entire backlog.

I’ll get the bad news regarding that out of the way: as we’re dealing entirely with post-millennial FSOL here, you bet your bottom dollar Environment Five goes deep into the psychedelic bubble, an attribute that has made their Amorphous Androgynous material a bit of a chore for all but the most dedicated listeners. No, wait a second, that’s not bad news in the slightest! Why shoulda musically dynamic duo remain stuck making tunes they hashed out two decades hence? They can’t very well go around claiming themselves the Future Sound Of London if they don’t keep pushing themselves in finding what future sounds they can craft (for London). Going avant-garde psychedelic-classicalism is good news!

The better-good news is, as Environment Five is all new material, it means Dougans and Cobain had a specific theme in mind while composing this album. Not that the previous Environments lacked themes, but those felt cobbled together - tracks served in creating general moods or milieus, but having little to do with each other. Five, on the other hand, flows like an album proper, with lengthy set pieces, short quiet interludes, and musical ideas and leitmotifs sprinkled throughout. Seriously, they sure love using that... saxophone? I think it’s a saxophone, but knowing these guys, it could be a Tibetan reed-woodwind that only sounds like a saxophone, or even an overlay of the two.

Anyhow, the PR blurbs described Environment Five as an exploration of death. No, not in a morbid, goth manner – there’s more sense of spiritual awakening and contemplation with the music here, as though death is a release from our limited, mortal shells, with realms both grand and humbling awaiting us to explore. Definitely an ambitious venture, and the music does offer tantalizing glimpses. There’s sombre pianos (Source Of Uncertainty, Viewed From Below The Surface), minimalist electro-dub (Machines Of The Subconscious), ethno-fusion baroque (Dying While Being Held), creepy cinematic ambient (Beings Of Light, The Dust Settles), future-shock freak-outs (Somatosensory), and jubilant psychedelic world-beat (In Solitude We Are Least Alone).

Honestly though, this concept of ‘death experiences’ isn’t iron-clad, at least compared to some of FSOL’s earlier concept albums (Lifeforms, Dead Cities). It’s nice they gave us something to latch onto if we’re so inclined, but as a collection of new The Future Sound Of London musics, it’s an enjoyable play-through regardless. Well, so long as you’re not still clinging to Papua New Guinea retreads. Let some of those prog rocks jams worm their way into your eternal being, guy.

The Future Sound Of London - Environments 4

fsoldigital.com: 2012

It's surprising there's so little talk of Environments out there in interwebland. The Future Sound Of London was a big freakin' deal back in the '90s, why even a very important duo in the world of electronic music. I get that Dougans and Corbain are quite content in remaining independent with their output now, but the nice thing about being on a major like Virgin is the over-aggressive promotion such a label provides. Okay, such hype's annoying as Hell when the music's bunk; can you imagine FSOL putting out anything that wasn't at least average though? Thus here we are, three straight albums of class material, and barely a whisper about them within the usual rags. Sign of the times indeed.

As before, I must turn to the track list titles for an idea of what theme Environments 4 aims at creating, however tenuously. No Man's Land (dark ambient lifeforms), River Delta (psy dub by way of Ultimae!), Supercontinents (modern classicalism), Sediment (chilling on the shores of Goa), Vast Landscape (weirdness with closed frets plucks low on a guitar neck)... ah, geomorphology. Wait, that's what I've been studying for God knows how long now. I can't be mixing college and hobby here, it'll screw up my upcoming finals. Damn it, is this a nice rock, and is this a gneiss track?

No, wait, that’s not right. A chunk of the E4’s middle deals with fat ol’ Sol. Sunsets (slow jam prog rock), Photosynthesis (beach-view ambience), Stand A Little Less Between Me And The Sun (Robert Fripp’s in tha’ house), and maybe even Long Day (beatnik poetry in the park?) all could have links to that blazing white orb we see on the cover art. And if that’s the case, what of Architektur (noise rock jam in an Indian jungle!?), Murmurations (quick, let’s get this hippie music session on the rockin’ road?!), and Fibrillation (watch those proteins fibre-ize like mini-machinery!?!?) sounding all sciencey and egg-headed, having nothing else to do with the surrounding titles? Gads, is E4 every a confounding one.

Heh, no not really. What it does sound like is the ambient B-side to an album from FSOL’s psychedelic side-project, Amorphous Androgynous. Swell thing, if we were dealing with the ‘90s version of that alias, but most fans lost the plot with them following The Isness (which confounded fans further when Hypnotic released it under the FSOL banner in America). It wasn’t a bad album by any stretch (somehow earning a 6/5 from Muzik Magazine), but not the sort of music folks wanted from Dougans and Corbain at the time, if ever. Pft, as if they should cater to the wishes of a petulant fandom. The FSOL are followers of their oft-time weird muses, not pigeon-holed lackeys.

Environments 4 is yet another lovely collection of music, if you’ve a place for psychedelic jam-scapes along with your downtempo and chill. It’s understandable why those only familiar with their ‘90s output wouldn’t like it though. If only FSOL still had ace PR.

The Future Sound Of London - Environments 3

fsoldigital.com: 2010

So I skipped the first Environments. It wasn't because of the general shrug from fan-based opinions on it, oh no. Rather, it was its presentation, a mere two tracks averaging about twenty-five minutes, each plainly titled Environments. If that doesn't come off about as lazy as anything the Future Sound Of London's put out, I don't know what else could top it (no, From The Archives doesn't count). Lengthy ambient soundscapes are already a dubious proposition, and while I've no doubt the FSOL can capably craft such music, part of their appeal's long been the quirky titles they give their tracks. They're like a guiding suggestion in what imagery is created with their soundscapes. Compared to names like Spineless Jelly, Smoking Japanese Babe, and Antique Toy, Environments is vague and dull.

Dougans and Corbain must have realized this weakness in the first Environments, every piece of music since of digestible length and with an individual identity. While it's unfortunate they still aren't composing albums as distinct thematic wholes, this approach is far preferable to the formless method before. At least, that's how I like my FSOL, hence skipping on the first one.

Okay, I shouldn’t say Environments is totally without theme, as II, 3, and 4 do have self-contained premises, even if it’s only hinted through track titles (do you see why it’s important?). E3 features names like Sunken Ships, The Empty Land, The Oldest Lady, and End Of The World, so we’re in future-shock desolation territory again.

E3 may as well be Dead Cities: 100 Years After, a reasonable assumption considering The Empty Land sounds like a mash-up of My Kingdom and In A State Of Permanent Abyss (and boy, does that ever further beg the question whether all these Environments albums are repurposed old material or spankin’ new compositions). The cataclysm that caused the fall of civilization is an old memory, occasionally retold by aging elders but seldom reflected upon by the surviving generations. Those who remain are eking out a new life for themselves, building upon the structures of old, a somber struggle of a stubborn people. Summer’s Dream has quiet, clicking machinery minding its own business as ominous pads weave about; A Glitch In Cellular Memory is cheerful and jubilant, while Recollection following it invokes child innocence and whimsy. Beware those that will steal what’s yours through dark ambient techno in A Diversionary Tactic, or false complacency as tranquil pianos play in Hall Of Mirrors and gentle guitars strum in Sense Of Being. For, in this uncertain world, who know what electro horror lurks beneath Surface Waters, ready to undo all that was regained.

Yeah, as I’ve said, writing the finer details of FSOL’s music isn’t the easiest, especially when they allow themselves this much freeform expressionism. Environments 3 is another great body of work from the duo though, one that can take you to captivating surroundings, provided you have a foundation to start from.

The Future Sound Of London - Environments II

fsoldigital.com: 2008

Yes! A return to my normal backlog, however briefly. I'd been eyeing The Future Sound Of London's semi-return with some interest these past couple years, curious what the deal with all these releases were about. The From The Archives compilations seems self-explanatory, but my God they just keep coming out with them. Dougans and Cobain also released a few more Amorphous Androgynous albums, though as they're still exploring the roads of psychedelic music that was The Isness, I can't say an album titled The Peppermint Tree & The Seeds Of Superconsciousness looks promising. Then there's Environments, initially the mysterious album advertised in Lifeforms that never came to be, now up to its fourth volume. What's the deal, then?

Though details remain sketchy, Environments was hinted at being what ISDN was: a collection of live-broadcast material of generally free-form music making. You can imagine Virgin, already feeling leery about FSOL's new-found experimental tendencies, would balk at such an endeavour. So to the back-burner Environments went as Dougans and Corbain focused on Dead Cities instead. As the millennium turned, the FSOL were back in charge of their own distribution, and started making available all that originally archived material. Thus, Environments gets its long overdue release in 2007. The world of electronic music shrugged.

Fortunately, that album garnered enough interest to warrant follow-ups, where the narrative of FSOL’s output gets murkier. Far as anyone knew, there was only one Environments, so were these albums new material, or had it also sat fallow all these years? It wouldn’t surprise me if it was a mixture of both, but until we get concrete confirmation, we may as well sit back and enjoy what we do have.

While every Environments album is primarily about exploring sound-forms, Environments II has a loose winter theme running through it. Track titles like Ice Formed, North Arctic, Glacier, and Newfoundland are self-explanatory, while Small Town, Nearly Home, and A Corner may also work in you know your Canadiana (are we certain this isn’t a Boards Of Canada album?). Of course, Serengeti totally deep-sixes that theory, but that’s just one track, and it contains droning voice pads that could invoke glacial imagery just as easily.

As for the music itself... um, it’s FSOL? Describing their future sounds was difficult enough for albums with actual themes, and there’s little hope of proper detail here without bursting the self-imposed word count. Here’s a taster: electro crops up in Factories And Assembly; Glacier would go great with an opium den; Baco Manu comes off like Jan Hammer on acid; Colour-Blind cribs Vit Drowning’s beats; Journey To The Center and Viewed From Above features orchestral arrangements.

Stylistically, Environments II isn’t that far a leap forward from their ‘90s output, though hardly dated either, as the FSOL were already light-years ahead in musical craft back then. The fact they can still release music unlike anyone else in the experimental chill-out scene to this day is all the proof you need this album’s worth your attention.

The Future Sound Of London - Lifeforms (EP)

Astralwerks: 1994

Oh yeah, there was also a track called Lifeforms on Lifeforms, which became a single from Lifeforms. Fortunately, I can talk all about Lifeforms on this EP titled Lifeforms, so nothing was lost in bypassing Lifeforms on Lifeforms. This opening is funnier if you read-sing it like Data in Star Trek: Generations. “Lifeforms, you silly little lifeforms...”

Poor Virgin. They go and sign The Future Sound Of London, likely believing the duo a high prize in the early ‘electronica’ sweepstakes. With such a massive hit like Papua New Guinea to their credit, plus oodles more under other guises and remixes, surely the FSOL would put Virgin at the forefront of trendy club culture. Well, nuts to that, said Cobain and Dougans, they wanted to get all conceptual and shit for their major label debut. Fair enough, just make a couple singles available for Virgin to promote and- wait, FSOL are making the EPs themselves? But we had all these remixers planned already: one for the House Mix, one for the Progressive House mix, and one for the Techno Mix. Not even one for the Hardcore Mix? Dammit, FSOL, who do you think you are, artists?

Lifeforms (the track) was about as club-friendly as anything got on Lifeforms (the album ...ugh, this is getting confusing), so tapping it for single duty made sense. As the FSOL preferred turning their EPs into mini-albums in their own right, we’re offered seven different ‘paths’ taken on the Lifeforms idea. Beyond familiar nature sound effects, most of these paths bare scant resemblance to the album version (Path 3). Path 1, for instance, is mostly an ambient affair with water drums, droning industrial synths, and a chant that I don’t recall hearing in the album. Path 2, meanwhile, comes off more urgent and twitchy, throwing in different acoustic and wind instruments as a tense bassline bubbles and builds underneath – it rather sounds like an extended incidental moment from the album, and it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if that was the case.

Path 4 and Path 5 are the real highlights though. Both are refined takes on Life Form Ends (itself an alternate version of Lifeforms on Lifeforms), each exploring the expansive soundscapes FSOL enjoy indulging in, all the while excellent drum programming keeps things moving at a brisk pace. It’s the Papua New Guinea template taken to another level, if not in dancefloor effectiveness, then in conceptual execution (God, does that ever sound pretentious).

Path 6 serves as a minor interlude repeating sounds heard in the prior couple paths, and Path 7 bookends the EP with a similar tune to Path 1, but with more sounds and beats added from the other tracks. So a tidy conclusion to Lifeforms, the EP, and though not as varied as Lifeforms, the LP, it makes for a worthy companion piece. Kind of a closer study of some specific organisms you might have encountered while travelling the weird, wild world FSOL created with the album proper.