Brian Eno with Daniel Lanois & Roger Eno - Apollo - Atmospheres & Soundtracks (1983)

Ambient weightlessness at its most divinely spacious and melodic.  Recorded for Al Reinert's documentary on the Apollo missions, which wouldn't be finalised until 1989, this 1983 LP collected all the original music.  Sampled heavily by subsequent artists, and reappropriated for other film soundtracks, Apollo - Atmospheres & Soundtracks is still a standout in the careers of Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois and Roger Eno.

Making extensive use of the then-new DX7, Eno further processed the sounds of the synthesizer to create a spacey, floating atmosphere.  Mixed in with this at intervals is the sound of pedal steel guitar, played by Daniel Lanois, more associated with country music.  On Eno's part, this was a deliberate stylistic choice, finding country imbued with a sense of weightlessness when he heard it as a child, and also drawing the link between country as music of the American frontier with the space missions.  All of it is magnificent in its desolation - no highlights necessary to list.  Just play the whole thing, and drift in space.

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Previously posted at SGTG:
Another Green World
The Plateaux Of Mirror
The Pearl

Harold Budd & Brian Eno with Daniel Lanois - The Pearl (1984)

For their sequel to the eternally gorgeous Plateaux Of Mirror, Budd & Eno added Daniel Lanois as producer, and Plateaux's piano & sound treatments blueprint into a masterpiece.  The Pearl was very much cut from the same cloth, but also improved on the formula, and nudged it closer to pure ambient music.

Much of the joy of The Pearl is in the small details: the occasional environmental sounds in the mix, the closer blending of the piano and electronics, and the more pronounced production touches on Budd's simple melodies, for instance the echo delay on the sparse notes of Their Memories.  A beautiful album that suits background listening and close attention equally well.

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