Nocturnal Emissions
Sunspot Activity
Soleilmoon Recordings SOL52
Track listing
For almost two decades Nigel Ayers as Nocturnal Emissions has maintained
a singular iconoclastic vision, to produce music that is innovative and
challenging. He has survived the "Industrial era" that produced
a spate of visceral recordings (no doubt leaving many listeners with hearing
impairments), been sampled by Afrika Bambaata and The Soul Sonic Force,
moved to the solitude of the Derbyshire countryside and composed moments
of sheer beauty and reflection and has been embraced by performance dance
troupes. Each album has broken new ground and Sunspot Activity
is no exception. Ayers makes no attempts to disguise the unashamedly lo-tech
conception of the sound sources used: the crackle and distorted drift
of a vinyl run-out groove, bursts of reverse loop bells and chimes, fractured
electronic layers of the analogue kind and snatches of cosmic radio frequencies
all merge seemlessly to create a hypnotic and tangibly coherent night-time
soundtrack.
Robert H. King
Variant 4
Nocturnal Emissions' Sunspot Activity (Solielmoon Recordings) is brilliant. Track 2, "ii" is addictively dreamy with a nightmarish occasional screech of metallic sound over its distant melody. The LP reminds me of that dreamlike, anaesthetic state, where the sounds you hear dredge up from memory - lost distant melodies funnelled through present disturbances and clinks. We've all been there.
Carolina Pulse