can

Context is everything -- or almost everything -- at Essential Elsewhere, these being albums you can return to repeatedly so probably stand outside of time, yet are always born of a specific place and time. Even if they owe nothing to it. And these two albums - the first "pair" of Essential Elsewhere albums -- seem to owe very...
> essentialelsewhere/1970/fripp-and-eno-no-pussyfooting-1973-and-evening-star-1975/

Musical innovations can happen by accident or out of necessity: a stoned John Lennon allegedly spooling the tape of Rain into his player the wrong way and discovering the sound of backwards guitars (he wanted the whole song released in reverse, but settled for just the coda); or Brian Eno who was mostly confined to bed after an accident...
> essentialelsewhere/2208/neu-neu-1971-neu2-1973-neu-‘75-1975/

You never know quite how people are going to turn out: they find bodies under the floorboards in the house of that polite boy next door, the rebel girl in school becomes a nun, and David Sylvian . . . .? When David Sylvian (born David Batt in Kent, 1958) first appeared on the music scene it was as a member of the glam rock band Japan and it...
> essentialelsewhere/2760/david-sylvian-gone-to-earth-1986/

And in this further installment, our heroes effect a blend of Barrett-era Floyd (given a techno twist) and Baba O'Reilly-meets-Pseudo Echo (on the soundstage of Bladerunner) then set their control to the heart of dancefloor synthedelic music. Add some pure pop vocals out of the Brian Wilson school with a few nods to Kraftwerk's Motorik...
> music/3227/the-chemical-brothers-further-parlophone/

This might not be what some would expect from the techno stars Underworld, but this excellent compilation serves a number of purposes outside of being fascinating in its own right. It is a collection of some of their favouite tracks from the more meditative end of the musical spectrum so has a kind of neo-ambient, avant-jazz flavour, and...
> jazz/2838/underworld-vs-the-misterons-athens-k7-border/

Anyone coming to this sprawling and musically diverse (not to say sometimes bewildering) 80 minute album because they were seduced by the Lips' earlier album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (with that sublime hit Do You Realise) might want to take a big breath. This is different in many, many ways. This is the Lips' fascinating and...
> music/2614/best-of-elsewhere-2009-the-flaming-lips-embryonic-warners/

Understandably, many hail the Sixties as the greatest ever decade for popular music: the undeniable brilliance of the Beatles and what they spawned on both sides of the Atlantic, not to mention globally; the whole shift from pop to rock, and from singles to albums, which freed minds and arses that followed; the innovations of Hendrix, Cream and...
> essentialelsewhere/2654/this-heat-this-heat-1979/

Even during his days in Roxy Music, Brian Eno professed an admiration for not just the music coming out of the German electronic movement (Can and so on) but for their collective spirit. They often lived communally and kept outside the mainstream, and (the commune thing excepted) so did he. That they had so many musical interests in common...
> music/2655/harmonia-and-eno-76-tracks-and-traces-reissue-gronland-rhythmethod/

By definition most people miss cult acts. And to their tuned-in loyalists that makes them even more special. There is nothing like the whiff or martyrdom, or being ignored or misunderstood, to elevate a musician’s reputation among the faithful. Like most people, I missed Can in the late 60s/early 70s. No matter, the albums are out...
> absoluteelsewhere/2306/can-the-catalogue-and-the-cult-talkin-bout-a-revolution/

Not only does this excellent overview of the German electronic scene come in at a whopping and thorough three hours, but it also has good timing: it is released just as Kraftwerk make a rare return appearance in New Zealand. This ambitious (but not officially sanctioned) look at Kraftwerk's place in the techno-cosmos places the group within...
> film/1996/best-of-elsewhere-dvds-2008-kraftwerk-and-the-electronic-revolution-dvd/

While it is entirely possible to live a happy and fulfilled life without hearing any music by Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, there really is no need to be so deprived given the extensive re-issue programme that was undertaken after his death in 1993. All the Zappa/Mothers albums are out there on remixed, remaster and re-packaged...
> essentialelsewhere/2087/the-mothers-of-invention-uncle-meat-1969/

By definition most people miss cult acts. And to their tuned-in loyalists that makes them even more special. There is nothing like the whiff of martyrdom, or being ignored or misunderstood, to elevate a musician’s reputation among the faithful. Like most people, I missed Can in the late 60s/early 70s. No matter, the albums are out...
> absoluteelsewhere/1848/can-a-concept-a-cult-a-band-as-only-the-germans-can/

In the rush to acclaim Kraftwerk as electro-pioneers, it is often overlooked how they grew out of the German avant-garde/post-hippie prog-rock scene. As Organisation and on the first two Kraftwerk albums, founders Ralf Hutter and Florian Schneider (and others) engaged in long, almost free-form jams with Schneider playing flutes and bells....
> essentialelsewhere/1994/kraftwerk-trans-europe-express-1977/

Only a rare band could count among its admirers and proselytisers the young Johnny Rotten, David Bowie and Brian Eno, eccentric UK rocker Julian Cope, and Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream. Oh, and various contemporary classical composers, Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, and post-hippie rock fans. But then, Can from Germany were a...
> essentialelsewhere/809/can-tago-mago-1971/

As mentioned in the previous posting of the Travis and Fripp album, when guitarist Fripp got into the studio alongside musician-without-portfolio Brian Eno for the albums Evening Star and No Pussyfooting in the early 70s a particular magic was created. Not ambient music (that was to follow from Eno) but more like music as an emotional...
> music/1771/fripp-and-eno-beyond-even-1992-2006-opal-southbound/

Sometimes in history there comes that rare conjunction of the man, the time and his art.In the case of Jean Michel Jarre it seemed they were all out of alignment. He could not have chosen a more inhospitable climate into which release his work.Jarre's album Oxygene came out in France in 1976 but wasn't given release in Britain until the...
> essentialelsewhere/816/jean-michel-jarre-oxygene-1977/

These low-fi home recordings by Scott -- a member of the Bats and the Clean -- were recorded in the late 90s and those who demand their music polished and honed won't find much of interest here. But these delightful working drawing of songs, eerie instrumentals and sonic ideas -- all put down on a Tascam cassette recorder -- have much to...
> music/1396/robert-scott-tascam-hits-powertool-records/