HAPPY BIRTHDAY ECHOES
Sweet Sixteen!
Hear Echoes 24/7
subscribe to
Echoes On-Line
Need
the free RealAudio plug-in?
www.Real.com
Other questions?
Contact Echoes
|
October marks the 16th anniversary of Echoes! To celebrate, we're looking back to a group of towering figures in the Echoes pantheon. Their music exemplifies the sound we seek for Echoes--innovative, un-categorizable. We dubbed them "The Icons of Echoes." To commemorate a few more years of Echoes, this month we expand the group to sixteen. |
|
|
|
TOP SIXTEEN With long and diverse musical careers, it's nearly impossible to select a "definitive" album from each of our Icons of Echoes. So here's a highly opinionated list of noteworthy titles--many are old sentimental favorites. Most were on our "Best of Echoes" list for their respective years. |
 Brian Eno (with J. Peter Schwalm) Drawn From Life Drawn From Life is a quint- essential ambient recording that pushes in new directions. It's a cyber-noir sound, with an atmosphere of black and white cityscapes shot through a misty haze at night. It appeared on our Best of 2001 list. |
 Dead Can Dance 1981-1998 Dead Can Dance opened a doorway into worlds at once ancient and alien, frightening and glorious. 1981-1998 is a compilation of their 7 studio albums, live performances, and sundry collections. It reveals their music of ecstasy, a state of spiritual release that can be as serene as a Gregorian chant and as intense as a Persian dervish. We chose it as one of our best of 2001.
|
Steve Roach creates a synth-based music born from his techno-tribal rhythms but morphed into a Blade Runner urban landscape. Grooves shape-shift in a techno-zombie dance as modulating chords descend like cloud banks roiling out of a desert horizon.
|
Ackerman re-visits some of his classic compositions in new settings with fellow guitarist David Cullen. Much more than a "best of"--we love these arrangements and still love the originals too. A selection on our Best of 2004 list. |
Of all of R. Carlos Nakai's musical settings, this is our favorite. Eaton's exotic stringed creations, Clipman's world percussion, and the twin flutes--Native American and Tibetan of Nakai and Khechog-- a stellar combination! An Echoes Best of 2000.
Read John Diliberto's review. |
All of Loreena McKennitt's CDs are consistently great, but The Book of Secrets especially stood out--we named it one of our favorites of 1997, when it came out. "Night Ride Across the Caucasus" was a favorite track on Echoes, and "The Mummer's Dance" had a great video, which has been included in the remastered versions of 6 of her albums. |
 Michael Hedges Oracle We chose Michael Hedges's last album as one of the best of Echoes for 1996. |
Although it's not named after a season, it's about the forests of Montana in November. This gold album was George's first Grammy award winner, and an Echoes Best of 1994. |
Steve Tibbetts cracks open the serene veneer of spirituality and plunges into a world of volcanic fire and psychological turmoil. We rated it one of our best in 2002. |
Rich exults in a swampy, techno-tribal sound, with effective touches from guitarist David Torn, cellist Hans Christian and violinist Forrest Fang. Seven Veils is the soundtrack Joseph Conrad may have heard when he explored the Heart of Darkness. One of our Best of 1998.
|
Swiss harpist Andreas Vollenweider serves up another world fusion tour with Cosmopoly. He’s joined by an international cast including Bobby McFerrin, Djivan Gasparyan and Abdullah Ibrahim. It was our CD of the Month in April, 2000. |
Yo-Yo Ma's assemblage of musicians east and west is the kind of world fustion that's quintessentially Echoes. It was a Best of Echoes when it came out in 2002. |
A departure for Pat Metheny, perhaps--a solo acoustic CD--but his sound and style are unmistakeable in every strum. Tracks like his cover of "Ferry Cross the Mersey" and "Last Train Home" (which he also recorded for our Echoes Living Room Concerts Vol. 9) made this a Best of Echoes 2003. |
Mondo Head is centered on the acrobatic percussion grooves of Kodo, a Japanese taiko drum ensemble. Mickey Hart sets them in a boiling cauldron of global percussionists and ecstatic singers. It was our CD of the Month in May, 2002. |
Though Enya albums are rare events, they're all meticulous productions, as producer Nicky Ryan massively overlays her lush voice. The Memory of Trees landed a spot on our Best of Echoes 1995 list. |
 Vangelis Oceanic Prolific Greek synthesist Vangelis has appeared on our Best of Echoes lists three times over the years, including 1997's Oceanic. Even when he's not making soundtracks like "Chariot's of Fire," Vangelis sounds like he's scoring films. On Oceanic he takes the seas of the world as a thematic basis for synthesizer tone poems. |
Back to Top
Please
let us know what you think about this page.
Drop us an :email:
