Retro Spective

I've been going through a project where I'm sorting all of the 8500+ tracks or so on my phone into sensible folders, so if I'm in the mood for some quiet synthwave, I can hear that, and if I'm in the mood for some pounding EDM that's intense enough to melt your face off, then I can do that too. Another folder that I'm creating is synth/future pop, because it is mostly a repository of synthpop and futurepop from the 90s and beyond, as well as a few 80s songs that maybe fit better there than in the regular pop/rock folder (although those are mostly going to be co-located in both folders if so.)

As part of this project, I'm listening to literally every single song on my phone and then deciding after I've listened to it which folder to put it in (although honestly; I already know for most where they're going to go before I start, obviously.) This is obviously going to take me a long time, but it's nice to be working at home where I can do this on my personal computer in the background while working on my laptop. I finally finished the file names that started with numbers and the letter A and got to the letter B. The first artist here is B! Machine, one of the guys I heard of and got into a bit when I was going through my first late 90s A Different Drum discovery of underground synthpop that had survived the pop culture wasteland of grunge and folksy hippy rock that otherwise made up much of the 90s. While A Different Drum did end up hosting releases for a few good old boys who were "somebody" in the 80s, like Pete Byrne of Naked Eyes, Alphaville, Real Life and a few others, mostly the label was a showcase of guys who had always been underground synthpop guys who post-dated the 80s heyday of that kind of music. Nate Nicholl, the guy behind B! Machine was always that kind of guy; a very independent artist who had a unique style and apparently a fascination for Japanese culture (although that plays out not at all in his music, it is in the name of the band itself that he created for himself as a nom de plume.)

I recalled that my mp3s on my phone were lower in volume than the average, so I intended to open them with Audacity, boost the volume, and then resave them, but for some reason I couldn't open them in Audacity (although I could play them) so I went downstairs and got the CDs that I'd burned the tracks from and re-burned the audio so I could manipulate the volume level. Because I had stopped my inexorable march through my tracks to do this, I thought I'd have a look at the albums that I never picked up; I only had Infinity Plus as well as a few tracks and remixes on other CDs from A Different Drum. I knew for sure that he'd had at least one other album before signing with A Different Drum and at least one other album after Infinity Plus. Sure enough, most of his material is on YouTube and Spotify and Myspace even, as well as bandcamp, and most of his older stuff can be picked up as mp3 downloads from Amazon. 

B! Machine is a bit unusual; he has a very retro sound in some ways; a kind of tinkly bob nearly analog-sounding early 80s sound, but his style is completely different to anything being made back then. It's mostly got a kind of sonic subversive quality to it; rather than being overtly poppy or catchy, it instead is very dreamy, understated, and almost surreal sounding. Extremely minimalist, yet not harsh or cold for all of that. Almost always melancholy, although not dark in the way that classic Depeche Mode or the Cure were, the Infinity Plus songs that I had were always some of my favorite of that era of my life when I was picking up late 90s and early 00s synthpop. In spite of everything, perhaps, I found myself revisiting B! Machine much more extensively, and listening to his albums that I never bought back in the day. In fact, I find that I like many of them even better than Infinity Plus. If there's anything to be complained about with B! Machine, it's only that his style is so distinctive that it can start to sound a bit samey if you're not really paying attention to sometimes rather subtle differences. I wish I'd gotten on board earlier, because although I always liked Infinity Plus, I think that after that he got even better in general. I remember that he said online that at Todd Durant's recommendation (the label boss at A Different Drum) he get Jarkko Tuohimaa of Finnish synthpop/EBM hybrid Neuroactive (also on the same label for a time) to do some extra production on a few songs, which turned them... well, not exactly club thumpers, but maybe a slight bit more mainstream sounding. Neuroactive were a pretty minimalist outfit themselves in most respects. But Nicholl said that he learned a lot from what Tuohimaa did to the tracks, especially with regards to percussion, and I think that after Infinity Plus the albums get a little bit more accessible, at least. Although they still absolutely maintain the B! Machine sound. 

If you have any interest in electronic pop music, especially melancholy, minimalist, dreamy and surreal stuff, do yourself a favor and check out B! Machine. They were a bit of a surprise hit to me. I got Infinity Plus as part of a package deal with a number of other albums, if I remember correctly, or I might not have picked it up at all, but of that bunch, it's probably the one that has stuck with me the most. It was the most pleasant kind of "surprise and delight" offering; I had no expectations, but ended up really loving it. 

On Amazon you can buy the albums but you can listen to them on Youtube at least (and I believe Spotify as well) first:

• Aftermath (1998)
• Infinity Plus (1999)
• Hybrid (2001)
• The Evening Bell (2004)
• The Falling Star (2007)

As well as the compilation: Alternates and Remixes (2002). Youtube also has two of the singles, with the remixes and b-sides: "Angels" and "Forget", both from The Evening Bell album.

I hadn't expected to like Aftermath as much as I did, knowing that it was a freshman effort, but it's really good. At the same time, I found that after Infinity Plus that Hybrid and The Evening Bell were improvements in many ways on an album that I'd already liked for many years a great deal. The Falling Star didn't do quite as much for me for some reason. Maybe it was just B! Machine fatigue a little bit after listening to so many of his tracks back to back to back, though.

While I was listening to all of this, I took a break from work and read the last few chapters of the final book of The Belgariad too. I don't mind the Tolkienesque story beats as much as some people now do; in fact, I wish a few more people would be a bit more respectful of some of those beats. I know, I know—I often say you're better off not copying Tolkien too closely lest you invite unfavorable comparisons—but what I really mean is you need to understand what works and why and not reject anything even remotely Tolkienian for its own sake. While the same things that have always bothered me about this series are still very much evident. The inexorableness of prophecy/fate tends to take away the agency of the characters, making their actions feel less heroic, certainly. The caricaturish nature of the national personalities still bothers me somewhat, especially because the details are so often repeated. Other than that, I found that the plot still holds up relatively well, and the majority of the main characters still have enough charm and chemistry that they're enjoyable to read about. The series ends with a flurry of weddings that almost makes me think that he was influenced more by Jane Austen than he cares to admit (or his own wife, which he did admit.) Sadly, most of the characters almost ruin it here at the very end by being such ridiculous betas. That's probably a reflection of Eddings himself, but then again, I've never claimed to like the man personally, to the extent that I even know anything about him at all.

In any case, I liked it well enough that it convinced me to request the Malloreon from the library (I had to get interlibrary loan because our library doesn't have them for some reason) which I've only ever read once before, way back when I was still in high school in the latest 80s. I'll probably have David Eddings fatigue by then. I'm also revisiting some other epic fantasy from the 80s; Raymond Feist's Riftwar Saga and the original Dragonlance Chronicles. I've heard that Legends is an even better trilogy, but I figure I better re-read the Chronicles first. 

I doubt I'll try to reread Terry Brooks. I've only ever read the first Shannara book once, I think. When I tried to re-read it, it didn't grab me at all, and when I tried to read the sequel the same thing happened. Not quite sure why; I remember liking it well enough when I first read it. Then again, I was probably a dumb 14 year old back then.