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"...I started on Monday morning and by Friday it was all done..."

Started by Shoulders?-Stomach!, June 20, 2010, 06:22:24 PM

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Shoulders?-Stomach!

I increasingly think this was one of the greatest records of the 20th century:



QuoteSpace was a 1990 ambient house concept album by Jimmy Cauty and Dr. Alex Paterson under the alias Space.


"...Space began as a collaboration between Dr. Alex Paterson and Jimmy Cauty, the original line-up of The Orb. It was, according to Cauty's record label KLF Communications, to be The Orb's debut album, but when Cauty left The Orb in early 1990 to concentrate on producing music as The KLF with Bill Drummond, he took the recordings with him. Reworked them to remove Paterson's contributions, and released the album on the KLF Communications label, with Cauty alone receiving credit. According to Cauty, "It was a jam, all done on Oberheim keyboards. Loads of samples... were chucked in there as well. I started on Monday morning and by Friday it was all done..."

It truly is the underestimated ambient house masterpiece. God knows what it would've sounded like with Alex Paterson's input included, but Cauty's reworked edition has some of the most spine-tingling moments of electronic ambient I've ever heard. It's here if you want a listen yourself: http://anorthcountrybhoy.blogspot.com/2010/03/space-klf-space.html

Granted, I don't think the first half is much cop, but the sound and sample pallette couldn't really be more up my street. Spacey squiggles, operatic singing, chimes, and at the back of it all, this untampered silence. It isn't very densely layered at all. It's wonderful.

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This is only partly about that, as the title alludes to. What other work do you know that was completed in such a short time and to such a high standard? Recommend the shit out of those records using this thread please, muckers.

weekender

I always wondered what the 'Recorded Live in 45 minutes' meant on the KLF's 'Chill Out' album.  The best I can get is from here, which suggests that it was done using 'DATs and tapes mixed together'.  Presumably in 45 minutes, but there must have been a plan there.  I don't believe that an album that good could be recorded completely accidentally.

That said, the other obvious example of a quick album is The Beatles's 'Please Please Me'.  14 tracks, recorded over three three-hour sessions on one day.  Considering the tracks include 'I Saw Her Standing There', 'Please Please Me', 'Love Me Do' and 'Twist And Shout', I think it's pretty impressive.  Lennon's vocals on the latter track are frantic, and that just adds to the excitement of the album.  It's not up there in the pantheon of the best songs the Beatles ever wrote, but it's a fucking good account of them live, and to have recorded the whole thing in one day in 1963 is very impressive.

Serge

None of them knocked off in a week, but I find it incredibly impressive that within the space of a year, Bowie wrote and recorded 'Low' and "Heroes", and wrote most of (and produced and played on) Iggy's 'The Idiot' and 'Lust For Life'. Four classic albums in a year is pretty good going.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Personally, even if God did create the Earth and everything in it in 7 days, I would still find Jimmy Cauty doing SPACE in 5 more impressive.

El Unicornio, mang

The Doors debut was recorded in 6 days, and the first Hendrix album in just three.

Serge

If I'm remembering rightly, Manuel Göttsching's epic 'E2-E4' was recorded in the space of one evening. I think he claims it took as long to record as it does to listen to, but I think he might be gilding the lily a little bit there.

Guy

Quote from: weekender on June 20, 2010, 07:52:07 PMI always wondered what the 'Recorded Live in 45 minutes' meant on the KLF's 'Chill Out' album.  The best I can get is from here, which suggests that it was done using 'DATs and tapes mixed together'.  Presumably in 45 minutes, but there must have been a plan there.  I don't believe that an album that good could be recorded completely accidentally.

It sounds like they mean that the tracks were already recorded individually, and the sequenced album was mixed together track-by-track in one take. In the manner a DJ would do a mix, but with the tracks coming off tape instead.

Quote from: El Unicornio, mang on June 20, 2010, 11:58:37 PMThe Doors debut was recorded in 6 days, and the first Hendrix album in just three.

That's not quite the same thing as the album Shoulders is on about though, because those bands will have gone into the studio having already written and rehearsed the songs that they then recorded. The Space album was composed and recorded, from scratch, in a week.