RFI – Uwe Schmidt (a.k.a. Atom Heart, Flanger, Senior Coconut, etc.)

I thought Alien Symphony was great as well. I think you were the one that recommended it to me. I dig Liedgut a lot too, even if it's very lightweight, the sounds on there are beautiful, and I prefer a brisk 35-minute electro workout to some of the mid-90's stuff he was doing, where every album seems to be 70+ minutes long.

i own

flowerhead
b2 (live in barcelona / berlin)
silver sound
binary amplified super stereo
machine paisley
tokyo-frankfurt-new york (HAT)
mono ™
fonosandwich

thinking of buying

dots
interactive music
ondas (datacide)
brown
built (n+)

any opinions on the ones i'm thinking of buying?

I've been listening to a lot of this guy's output lately, and it's pretty amazing how much quality stuff he managed to put out early in his career. In 1994 alone he released 8 solo albums plus 5 albums in collaboration with others, and all of those that I've managed to hear have been either good (Flextone, Morphogenetic Fields, Orange) or great (Dots, Live At sel i/s/c, Datacide, Plane). I'd say it's a fucking tragedy he abandoned the sort of sublime, adventurous ambient sound he was building on these albums in favour of some IDM wankery and electro goofiness. (Though I have enjoyed the occasional dancey project by him, like Alien Symphony.) Is there's anything in Mr. Schmidt's later catalogue that would be equivalent to the ambient/techno sound of those early records?

As far as I can tell, Flowerhead is his last "serious" effort, after that the goofy stuff starts...

I highly rate everything up to RI40, especially RI30, RI31 and RI32

Really? Out of curiosity I bought "Machine Paisley" (RI35), because it was one of the more reasonably priced Rather Interesing releases, but the IDM sound on it was just so limp and thin, and his humour does nothing to me. Can you say what post-Flowerhead albums are non-IDM/non-goofy?

winterreise, liedgut and 1i3835tra3um3 are all great

the second geeez n gosh album "nobody knows" is always remaindered for pennies somewhere and FLIPIN AWESOME

more regarding to tuomas's request, the dos tracks would probably be of interest

minus that first "to"

and make that the dos tracks *album*, cannot fkn type

What's the opinion on VSVN? That one and Flextone are the only ones among his early albums that I haven't got yet, but since VSVN was never reissued, you have to pay quite a sum for even a used copy, so I'm wondering whether it's worth the price?

only ever got DOTS and Flextone of the RI label (oh, just rememnbered, Masters of Psych Ambiance with Testuo), never seen nor heard VSVN ..

for those into his jazzy-funky glitchy stuff, naturalist from 1998 has recently been added to Spotify and it's a good one if you dig that style.

i hope he reissues Masters Of Psychedelic Ambiance...

haven't heard that one, what's it like?

it's sort of all over the place.. soft swooping sounds, drones, bells, field recordings, a few downtempo clicky things that kinda remind me of Voices From The Lake... it's pretty cohesive and almost low-key, though, despite the variety.

i prefer the jazzy-funky glitchy stuff

I wasn't super impressed by Masters of Psychedelic Ambience, it's basically a showcase of different sounds Schmidt and Inoue came up with, 20+ short tracks with each track highlighting a new sound. Fun to listen for a while, but not much depth to it, IMO it doesn't have the the sort of long-lasting pleasure the Datacide albums (particulary Flowerhead) have, if we're talking about Atom/Inoue collabs.

yeah but that's what i like about it! short ambient tracks are cool!

but yeah the Datacide albums are great

One of the biggest dogs, its off its chain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCNG3Qw9e9k

definition of the big dog in fact

bit overplayed again now tho!

That's a good one. Not too dear now that it's been repressed. This guy has so many guises it's difficult to know where to start. Some of the more dance floor orientated stuff is only available on CD any way. This one for an example..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqgLKtt0uns

that cold memories release on sähkö is pretty good

he plays every couple years at a music festival i've gone to and tends to attend most of the other events during the fest, seems like a dude who loves to hang out and listen to other sets w/friends, too

he did a set as atom(tm) with robin fox, a visual dude who does insane laser and light shows, that was intense

guys why in the fuck did no one ever tell me about about SURTEK COLLECTIVE and the invention of "acitone"??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6IWZTI6br4

lol what the hell was that

I've seen uwe schmidt live a couple times in the last few years but somehow was ignorant of that project

I'm guessing the name is inspired by nortec collective?

i've basically lost track of time since 2010 (2017 is my attempted return to temporality and the real world) but one thing has been fairly constant:
i've gone to mutek in montreal six of seven years
uwe schmidt has had a performance of at least one of his projects nearly every year
he sticks around and attends shows the entire weekend and seems like a chill dude

the flanger show last year was pretty cool

compare to original

that shari vari vid is one of my favorite things ever

kinda fell off this dude after "HD", what's worth hearing now?

Love that Surtek! Thanks.

https://headphonecommute.com/2020/04/27/in-the-studio-with-atom/

this was a cracking read.

Headline suggests a minimal studio, images proceed to show a load of very tasty gear. Not an excessive amount but come round my gaff if you want to see not "too much".

yeah, images do imply that, but the interview provides a different insight.

this new album is pretty fun, haven't really caught up with him since HD

does he still use a dozen different names or is it pretty much all done as Atom TM right now?

really good interview. thanks.

i confess that i only clip listened to the new album and found the vocals offputting. should i give it a full listen?

does he still use a dozen different names or is it pretty much all done as Atom TM right now?