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Soundscapes will be closing permanently on September 30th, 2021.

Open every day between Spetember 22nd-30th

We'd like to thank all of our loyal customers over the years, you have made it all worthwhile! The last 20 years have seen a golden age in access to the world's recorded music history both in physical media and online. We were happy to be a part of sharing our knowledge of some of that great music with you. We hope you enjoyed most of what we sold & recommended to you over the years and hope you will continue to seek out the music that matters.

In the meantime we'll be selling our remaining inventory, including thousands of play copies, many of which are rare and/or out-of-print, never to be seen again. Over the next few weeks the discounts will increase and the price of play copies will decrease. Here are the details:

New CDs, LPs, DVDs, Blu-ray, Books 60% off 15% off

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We will be resuming our closing sale beginning Friday, June 11. Our hours will be as follows:

Wednesday-Saturday 12pm-7pm
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Open every day between September 22nd-30th

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We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Thank you for your understanding.

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Sunday
Sep122010

WILLIAM ORBIT - Pieces In A Modern Style 2

The first volume of this series—whose wide release happened back in 2000—was an unexpected favourite of mine. Opinion often seemed split on whether it was an heir to Wendy Carlos or an entry-level muzak update of Hooked On Classics, but there was something about Orbit's unfussy electronic takes on classical pieces that really resonated with me (despite strong initial skepticism, I might add).

For starters, his love and reverence for the pieces was obvious—there was little attempt to add a throbbing techno pulse or glitchy hip hop break to the tracks. On some pieces, like the opener of Samuel Barber's "Adagio For Strings", it took a while to tell that it wasn't an orchestra. And even when he did go for a sound more obviously electro (as on Beethoven's "Triple Concerto"), the effect was tasteful and gorgeous in its own right. But that was Volume One...

This second time around, Orbit is much more comfortable with the idea of introducing elements from his own past as a storied house and dance producer (Madonna's Ray of Light, Blur's 13, the Strange Cargo series, etc.). Elgar's "Nimrod" bubbles and percolates like a pot on the edge of boil, driven forward by a gurgling bass line. Similarly, Grieg's "Peer Gynt" could easily be remixed to back a dark Kylie Minogue pop cut. Pieces such as Bach's "Arioso" and Faure's "Paradisum" hold truer to the original volume, but Orbit is definitely putting a heavier foot forward than previously. If Volume One was bringing modern technology into the past, Volume Two is much more about the album's titular ambition of bringing older pieces of music into a modern context.

If this sounds like something you'd hate, guess what? You probably will. I can't pretend for a second that what Orbit is doing here won't be seen by many as awful at best and sacrilege at worst. But again, despite the fact that I can see myself buying pants and drinking martinis to this album, I find myself inexplicably drawn to it. Perhaps it's because it so directly challenges the discrepancies between my pleasure centers and my taste centers (i.e. I like even though most of my 'critical' faculties tell me not to). Maybe it's because the more I listen to it, the better it gets. And besides, at its best, such as on Vaughan Williams' "Lark" or Tchaikovsky's "Swan Lake", Orbit offers a unique opportunity to see well-established pieces in an entirely new light—not to mention one that isn't solely based on making Nutcracker excerpts sound 'funky' to try and hawk cheesy Christmas gifts. Once again, Orbit dances on a knife's edge and manages to come out quite unscathed. Well played.

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