These ambient records aren’t necessarily the “best,” just ones I return to again and again when I’m in the mood to induce a zone state.

by Mark Saleski Being the musical egghead that I am, I tend to be very fond of Frank Zappa’s thoughts on composition. In particular, the idea that anything can be music. Yes, anything You May Also Like: Derek Wieland of Trans-Siberian Orchestra: The Albums That Shaped My Career Far OutRead More

by Tom Johnson 2004’s Equatorial Stars seemed like a reunion after 12 years apart for these two ambient giants. After all, the last we’d heard from them was on Eno’s 1992 album Nerve Net, but little did we know that they’d been working together the entire time. This album pullsRead More

I initially dismissed this, almost out of hand: There’s a reason people haven’t been rocking Robert Frost all this time. You May Also Like: How Brian Eno Made a Triumphant Return to Rock With ‘Nerve Net’

by Tom Johnson It isn’t necessarily that blemish was so drastically different than anything David Sylvian had done before. He’d done ambient, both alone and with such visionaries as Holger Czukay and Robert Fripp, and some of it verged on being noise to me. You May Also Like: Mark Papagno:Read More

by Tom Johnson I have a sort of extra-sensory perception relegated solely to picking up the faint signals thrown off by the arrival of music I want in a music store at a specific location. You May Also Like: Kait Dunton, with John D’earth – ‘Planet D’earth’ (2019) Mark Papagno:Read More

Their Ocean, ambient then soulful, is one of those amalgams that sounds instantly recognizable, yet completely new. The Chicago-based psychedelic R&B/indie rock group has described itself as “a cross between Hall and Oates and Arcade Fire, if they were friends with the Soulquarians.” As funny as that sounds, it’s aboutRead More

I have again entered the musical aesthetics zone. The usual question is “Why do I like that?” This time around, I want to get a little more general: Why does anybody like (or dislike) anything? How do people decide You May Also Like: Dave Seidel (Mystery Bear) – ‘Involution’ (2021)Read More

by Nick DeRiso Sounds of Saturn, a Fort Wayne, Ind.-based experimental trio, takes the road less travelled on Mars Via Parachute. In fact, often, they’re not on any road at all. Instead, the record employs every trick in the noodle-rock playbook, from psychedelia and stadium-shaking riffs to thrilling science-geek constructionsRead More

by Nick DeRiso The Orb’s signature sound — gorgeous but not quite ambient, hypnotic but typically not much more rhythmic than a chill-out room — always seemed to cry out for the guitar stylings of Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour. The band copped to the underlying influence on its debut album,Read More