Hans-Joachim Roedelius & Tim Story - Inlandish (2008)

Stately, melancholy ambience from two masters.  The story (no pun intended) goes that the younger, American musician first met one of his biggest German heroes in 1983, and ended up staying with him in Austria for a week.  Story & Roedelius wouldn't collaborate until over a decade later, but when they did they made a handful of albums together, of which Inlandish was the third.

It's a gorgeous album that bears all the Roedelius hallmarks you'd expect: sparse, affecting melodies on piano cocooned in gentle ambient waftings and burblings.  In this case, the pair worked from Roedelius' piano sketches, with Story filling out the backgrounds.  Occasional beat-driven tracks like Downrivers and Riddled keep a bit of energy going, but mostly this is mellow meditativeness par excellence.

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pw: sgtg

P.S. - Florian Schneider-Esleben, 1947-2020
R.I.P to one of the founders of electronic music's Big Bang, who has died of cancer at the age of 73. To celebrate Kraftwerk at the outset of their classic era, head over to Electronic Orgy, where they recently re-upped one of the most astonishing concert bootlegs ever taped.  Or hang out here and enjoy Electric Cafe from 80s Kraftwerk, when their contemporaries had began to catch up on them but they still had plenty to offer; or a recent celebration of early Kraftwerk performed by Zeitkratzer.

Tim Story - Glass Green (1987)

A few years down the line from their beginnings in solo instrumental music (see links below), Windham Hill began to diversify into more New Agey world music, jazz fusion, and ambient loveliness like today's post.  So to complete my collection from the label for now, here's the Windham Hill debut (he'd stay for one more release) by Philly-born ambient composer Tim Story.

Glass Green is a fitting album title for this kind of music: bright but diffuse, and beautifully melodic whilst staying on the right side of sacchrine.  It sounds quite digital; Story's hardware used on the record isn't specified, but well employed across ten atmospheric sketches that sometimes bring to mind the Eno & Budd collaborations.  It's also occasionally reminscent of Roedelius from a similar era, someone Story would go on to collaborate with (that's coming up in a week or two), as well as working with Moebius just before the latter's death.

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Windham Hill at SGTG:
Piano Solos | Autumn | December (George Winston)
Solid Colors | Unaccountable Effect (Liz Story)
Southern Exposure (Alex De Grassi)
Breakfast In The Field | Aerial Boundaries (Michael Hedges)
An Evening With Windham Hill Live (Various Artists)