Opinions on FAX Records and Pete Namlook

I'm *very* glad I never got into a completist thing with him -- the only FAX stuff I picked up was pretty much the few Instinct represses, and of them I've kept only Silence, Air and Compilation II. A case where I like those and need have no more. (Then again I have an insane amount of Muslimgauze stuff so go figure.)

I still enjoy FAX and I'm not ashamed to say it. There are certainly some real turkeys in the catalog, and the releases can be maddeningly uneven, but the classic releases have held up really well, and you have to hand it to Namlook for keeping this thing going for over 10 years. I'm glad he finally found a decent graphic designer to create the cover art, some of those early Ambient World reissues were downright ugly.

Some of my favorites:

Fires of Ork II especially the track "Sky Lounge"
Ambiant Otaku
Organic Cloud
2350 Broadway III
bits of the Silence series
"Free and Flowers" from Time^2
Jochem Paap: Vrs Ambnt Pcs

didn't FAX release "octopus" (the charles edwards uzzell eight-sequencer thing)?? i remember hearing bits of it in 95 and thinking "this is really great" but i can hardly find any information on it on the internet right now.

sort of like a proto-black dice in their current incarnation, but softer and driftier.

At least some minimal info on Octopus and all the FAX releases is up at www.2350.org .

haven't listened to any in ages .. but i do recall dreamfish 1~+2 being faves, and the stuff with atom heart .. and i like the one with jonas sharp was kinda cool .. but one that i really enjoyed was Bedroom by Daniel Pemberton .. who now soundtracks loads of Channel4 programms ..

i never really like the charles s-e stuff .. too environmental ..

weirdly - out of the blue i received email from mixmaster morris yesterday ..

may be its time to dust the discs down ..

Outland (Namlook/Laswell) in 2009 sounds brilliant.
i would love to have a proper stereo set up and listen to one of the new 5.1 releases, anyone here had such a pleasure ?
also, seems that his releases no longer get distributed to shops and its all available direct from pete himself, or, is that just because my local town no longer has any decent record shops ?

i am inheriting a collection of these, maybe a full collection, under very tragic circumstances. not particularly looking forward to that, but honored I've been asked to have it.

So Peter Kuhlmann's sad demise has inspired me to explore the FAX discography in more detail. And bloody hell the Hawtin / Namlook collab is the dogs B's, specifically 'From Within I'. Was familiar with a couple of tracks already but the whole thing is decent.

What are parts 2 & 3 like in that series and are there any other Fax no brainers I should be checking out? This thread seems a little underdeveloped given the size of the discography (although I realise it can be pretty hit and miss).

10 years on from my year of FAX addiction, and i have decided to add all the discs to the digital archive.

having just upgraded my speakers, its great to have walls rumbling to these sounds again.

suits the end of world weather thats going on outside.

Interviewed Move D last year, we got talking about Pete Namlook/FAX...he started crying. Very touching moment.

oh my ...

one of my very first email exchanges way way back in the days before google/internet explorer was actually with pete ..

i think i even printed them out (exciting times to get words back from a music maker !) and still have them somewhere.

hang on .. not 10.

doh.

20.

fuck i am old.

and the ones i have heard tonight still sound amazing.

beyond 'dated' now as mentioned upthread.

Man, I'm still bummed out I sold the first Shades of Orion album ten years ago, when I was going through an anti-ambient phase. I'm still hoping that someday I'll find a copy for less than a ridiculous price.

i only have SOO2 tuomas, sorry.

never seen a copy of #1, in its original nor AW reissue form ..

I'm not surprised, it seems that the Namlook + Inoue collabs and the Inoue solo albums are among the most valued of early Fax. They reissued some of the Inoue records (Zenith, Electro Harmonix, Eulengasse, Ambiant Otaku) a couple of years ago, but not Shades of Orion, nor Organic Cloud. And since it seems Fax has folded with Namlook's demise, there are no new reissues coming, and those Ambient World re-releases have become quite pricey too.

I wonder what's the situation now with Fax's back catalogue now? If anyone could continue running Fax even as a strict reissue label, it'd be a huge service to fans. Seems like they were on their way of reissuing most of the classic stuff via AW before Namlook died.

figuring out what to do with the catalogue must be a seriously complicated issued.
i mean even his web domain from which he ran the label from has lapsed, which is very sad, as it had a good record of what was available.
i would suspect he still had racks and racks of unsold stock, so surely the family will want some way to help fans get access to them (must have been part of the probate service figuring out the value ?)
luckily i have a few of the original namlook/inoue collaborations (original press of ambiant otaku is one of my faves !).
and and thanks for reminding me, organic cloud was always top of my buy upon sight discs, and i never did succeed on that score.

i have that shades of orion somewhere. if i can find it i'll send a rip yr way.

that would be much appreciated. ta.

long forgotten archive dig :

http://s.pixogs.com/image/R-150-123354-1289397681.jpeg

pre-FAX kuhlmann material.

time to add to the digital archive.

have no memory of what this is like.

suspect its somewhat new age (fingers x'd !)

ooops.

http://s.pixogs.com/image/R-150-123354-1289397681.jpeg

4 days on and i cannot listen to anything else but FAX.

ear candy perfection

So, I've been checking out some later day FAX albums, and I came across this artist called Gate Zero, who released 3 albums for the label (in 2005, 2006, 2011), and they're all prety dope, especially the first one. They're kinda atypical for FAX, the tracks are mostly just 5 or 6 minutes long, and there's a heavier emphasis on the beats, which are more minimal techno/IDM than ambient... But the slow, pretty synth drones Namlook loved are alsp there, so it still kinda fits FAX. Anyway, I'd totally recommend these, and since they're not by a "name" FAX artist, you can still get them for relatively cheap.

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

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luP9TXDZGeM

Also, the covers for the first two albums are among the prettiest in the FAX catalogue:

http://www.israbox.com/uploads/posts/2011-02/1296888154_500.jpg

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xoyq1zR1L.jpg

The third one is... something else:

http://www.gatezero-music.de/images/ps08124.jpg

you see, i have no love for the later era artwork ..

sorry.

give me the black outer, and then circle/triangle art anyday.

I dunno, the original design concept was iconic, obviously, but some of the latter albums were still able to do some cool things with the circle motif + modern computer graphics. Like this one:

http://www.synthema.ru/uploads/posts/2011-05/1305131881_1.jpg

I think that's a very neat way of summarizing the album's theme in a simple image.

the inner goth in me still prefers the black groove of the originals ..

(however, i get what you are on about .. )

I was listening to Tetsu Inoue's Inland (another great late-period FAX album) from 2007, and was wondering why I haven't heard about any newer releases from him... But after a quick googling, it turns out that record was the last one he's released, and since that he's totally disappeared, with no one (at least outside Japan) being able to track him down. There's some info here, but it's scarce.

I hope everything is fine with him and he's just taking care of family or something (as suggested by one comment on the site I linked to), it'd be terribly sad if something bad's happened to him.

I mean, the stuff he released on FAX, both solo and collabs, is pretty much my favourite ambient music of all time, it'd be awful if both he and Namlook had passed away before their time... So hopefully he's okay, and just taking it easy somewhere.

As mentioned above, lately I've been digging into late period (mid-00s to 2012) FAX, and I thought I might write short reviews of the stuff I've listened here, if only to amuse myself and Mark E. :) TBH when Namlook, I hadn't listened to any for FAX releases for years, and while his demise was sad, I thought at that point both the label and his music were well past their prime... But it turns out there are a lot of gems among the latter day catalogue, it's just that they seemed to have been ignored because FAX hadn't been a trendy label since the 90s.

Pete Namlook & Tetsu Inoue - 2350 Broadway 4 (2007)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/R-882897-1180633249_zps3fb164f4.jpeg

Before this album came out, Tetsu Inoue had left FAX years ago, and in the intervening years he'd relesed the sort glitchy, experimental digital ambient that was popular at the turn of the millennium. The records from this era that I've heard haven't really convinced me, it doesn't seem Inoue's strengths fit the glitch/click & cut approach well. Then he returned to FAX for a couple of records, and it's nice to hear his collab with Namlook sounds more like their 90s albums than what Inoue had been doing between. If you've listened to something like "Shades of Orion 2", you know what you're going to get here: glacially moving but incredibly warm and harmonious set of drones. There aren't any beats, no techno riffs or anything, just soft and slow ambience. This set really benefits from the 5.1. surround sound Namlook started to experiment with in 2006 (all his albums from that year on include both a 5.1. DTS disc and regular stereo CD), as the music makes you feel like being inside a cosmic womb. If you liked what these guys had done in the past, then this is a very fine return to form.

ha !

fully suspected there would be gems, but after the gold rush of 94-96, i never found anywhere that stocked FAX.

i assumed that pete has retreated from the 'industry' and was selling his material all by himself.

( and for financial reasons, i needed to break the habit )

of course, should i ever see any cd in the racks (new or otherwise), i would now purchase without a second thought.

Most of the releases from FAX's last years can still be found for a reasonable price (between 15 and 30 euros) in places like Amazon and Discogs.com. They eventually started to print only 300 copies of each album, probably because no one except for hardcore aficionados was following the label at that point. I assume Namlook's death (and the realization than none of this stuff will be reissued by Ambient World or anyone else in the foreseeable future) raised the interest in the latter day releases, but like I said, most of it is still available for decent prices. (Sadly that doesn't apply to "2350 Broadway 4"; the Namlook/Inoue collabs are among the most popular of FAX releases, so this one's long sold out too.)

Tetsu Inoue - Inland (2007)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/R-978540-1187190834_zps710fcf01.jpeg

After "2350 Broadway 4", it's not really surprising that "Inland" also sounds closer to Tetsu Inoue's 90s FAX releases like "Ambiant Otaku" than to the more experimental stuff he had made since leaving the label. This is still very much drone music, though the drones develop more than on the Namlook collab, and there are hints of melody and some well-placed snaps and crackles to be heard too. Overall the mood is quite content and blissful, I guess the title of the album could be a metaphor for home or some kind of inner peace? Like I mentioned above, apparently this was the last thing Inoue released before he completely disappeared. If it turns out to be his testament, well, it's a memorable, serene statement, though obviously I hope he'll one day return to music-making.

The original printing of "Inland" was sold out, but it was reissued by Ambient World in 2012, so this one still easy to acquire.

Thomas P. Heckmann - The Lost Tales, Vol I, Vol II, Vol III (2008, 2013)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/R-1280054-1309378918_zpsa7132894.jpeg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/R-1382965-1309380029_zps35b0f66b.jpeg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/S03cover_zps70c272e1.jpg

Thomas P. Heckmann is the guy behind pseudonyms like Skydiver, Age, and Drax, who's released techno, trance and ambient since the early 90s. Lost Tales Vol I and II are his only albums on FAX, and they're are simply collections of his unreleased tracks that Namlook decided to release for whatever reason. They're great stuff, though! The tracks on them are generally more dancey and trancey than what FAX was putting out around this time, but that's probably because at least some of the tracks date back to the 90s. Heckmann is a bit of a gearhead and synth-collector (as evidenced by this awesome video, where he shows you his studio and the ridiculous amount of vintage gear he has there), so there's loads sci-fi synthesizer freakouts there too.

Vol III was supposed to come out on FAX too, but that didn't happen because of Namlook's death. It was eventually released by Carpe Sonum, which is kind of a continuation label for FAX, as they're mostly putting out stuff by FAX-related artists, including records like this one that were originally supposed be released by Namlook. I'm glad Vol. III finally found its way to the world, because it's probably the best of the three, with some huge intergalactic analog synths that you just gotta love. It also has a beautiful little tune dedicated to Namlook, titled "Ode to a Friend".

you got these on cd ?

jealous.

(resistance still in tact ..)

and while i said i did not like the nu-era cover styles, i was wrong.
these are great.
still not sure re the white covers though.

There was a period at the turn of the millennium when, after discarding the classic circle motif, the FAX releases had a pretty awful graphics, like this:

http://s.pixogs.com/image/R-51535-1289210308.jpeg

But at some point they got a new designer called Andre Ruello, who I thought had a good sense of integrating the strong graphic profile of FAX's past into some cool new designs. Besides the Gate Zero covers I already posted, these are my favourite covers by him:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_JkhjwI7_bKs/TKd-FC7EpUI/AAAAAAAAB18/rCHfIsYN_24/s1600/4394974248_a7fec034a6.jpg.jpeg

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51z4l1PgD8L.jpg

re air : ouch !

re pearl ii : yes

saw an anthony rother cd in the bins a few months back and let it go ..

i knew i had heard his name from somewhere ..

ahhhh ..

(not this, but a full on electroclash release)

Namlook & Spyra - Virtual Vices V (2006)

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/500/81726055/Virtual+Vices+V+Folder.jpg

This one deviates quite a lot from the FAX norm in that it has loads of "real" instruments played by Namlook and Wolfram Spyra, there are even electric guitar solos! As a result the album often tends to sound more like fusion jazz or instrumental rock than ambient/techno... And I like fusion jazz in general, but the truth is that Namlook and Spyra aren't virtuosic enough as instrumentalists for their solos to impress me, and the sound on this album is too mannered and safe in general for this kind organic-electronic hybrid to go beyond what others have done better since the 1970s. This is not a bad album but it doesn't stand out in any way, so I couldn't be arsed to check out the other entries in the Virtual Vices series (there are 6 in total). The surround sound wasn't used particularly well on the record either, there isn't much of a difference between listening to it in 5.1. and in stereo.

Pete Namlook - Music for Urban Meditation I, II, III, IV (2004, 2007, 2009, 2012)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/41W3UA8UbjL_zps9452facb.jpghttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/41W3UA8UbjL_zps9452facb.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/51zyE2BikEL_zps963021e9.jpghttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/1334670477_music-for-urban-meditation-iv_zps6704b5d5.jpg

In his final years Namlook had two rolling solo album series, Pearl and Music for Urban Meditation. The latter one is recommended for dedicated ambient listeners only. There's no beats or melodies, and even the sweet cosmic synth sounds Namlook was best known are mostly absent. What you've got is all-encompassing, glacially moving drones, and that's it, pretty much. This kind of music is meant to envelop your full field of hearing, so playing the surround disc (the first album in the series is a regular stereo CD, but the other three include a 5.1 disc with it) works really well here. The title is a bit misleading, or maybe ironic, as this is not the sort of new age ambient you could use for meditating. (Unless Namlook meant the title to be read as "meditating on something"; in this case, the city.) As the track titles suggest, this is the music of cityscapes, and it can get pretty gloomy and harsh, even oppressing, though there's beauty there too. It's kinda hard to try to judge or analyze music like this, it's such a monolith: either it works for you, or it doesn't. To me it does, but it certainly isn't Sunday afternoon comfort music like many other Namlook ambient albums, you have to be in adventurous mood to put these records on.

Sorry, I posted one image twice there, it was meant to be this:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v655/lixnixn/419bn-3qjCL_zpsfc835da6.jpg

how bloody brilliant is this ..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwWETY5Vr2M

I've always felt a wave of melancholy when I think of Fax. The label passed me by during its heyday. Now Pete Namlook is dead, Tetsu Inoue appears to have vanished from the face of the early, presumably dead, the label is defunct, not just defunct but destroyed in such a way that most of the master tapes have been chucked out and no-one owns the rights any more. jeffery up the page back in 2005 points out the CDs go for high prices on the used market, and that's still the case. I'm sure you can get reissues, but just like the Vivien Meyer industry they're all vultures selling something they didn't help create.

And the music. It was the future in the late 1990s but now we live in the actual future most of it sounds very much of its time. There's a great internet ambient radio station called Sleepbot, and a fantastic podcast called Low Light Mixes - that's how I hear 90% of music - and they occasionally play tracks from Fax records, and they're good! The label's output appears to have been consistently good. It sounds very old-fashioned, even the later stuff like Inland, but because it was mostly minimal it hasn't dated all that badly. But there's still something wistful about futuristic music that wasn't really futuristic after all.

I didn't realise until recently that 2350 Broadway was an actual building. Bretton Hall, which at one time was apparently an artists' collective:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bretton_Hall_(Manhattan)

"In the early 1980s, an organization called Artists Assistance Services rented out apartments in the Bretton Hall to people in the arts, with the unusual proviso that they would have to share the use of the space with a "cultural activity" such as a karate class."

I wonder if Namlook etc benefited from this, or if it had stopped long before the 1990s. A quick google reveals that Wikipedia's source is an article in New York magazine from May 1985. "One of the things that seems most unfair about Upper West Side gentrification is that the people who paved the way for it, the musicians and artists who made it chic, are now among the ones being forced out by higher prices."

Apparently rents were really high in New York in 1985 and landlords weren't afraid to use underhand methods to drive the poorer tenants out. But that was 1985, I imagine things are a lot better now. Let's hope it doesn't happen here in Britain!

Meanwhile I am off to light the candle I use for heating in my unheated and in fact roof-less bedsit.

Hi, nice post. I hope you find some warmth.

As far as I know, Tetsu is still alive and well!

There were a bunch of these in Flashback in Islington this afternoon. No obvious bargains though.

and they occasionally play tracks from Fax records, and they're good! The label's output appears to have been consistently good. It sounds very old-fashioned, even the later stuff like Inland, but because it was mostly minimal it hasn't dated all that badly

great post.
this to the power of xxxx.
welcome to the FAX family Ashley.
better late than never.

the label is defunct, not just defunct but destroyed in such a way that most of the master tapes have been chucked out and no-one owns the rights any more. jeffery up the page back in 2005 points out the CDs go for high prices on the used market, and that's still the case. I'm sure you can get reissues, but just like the Vivien Meyer industry they're all vultures selling something they didn't help create.

I'm sure the rights for Namlook's solo recordings are owned by his daughter, but it doesn't seem she's interested in reissuing those. And the rights of collaborations and non-Namlook albums seem to have reverted back to the other artists, who are free to reissue them as they see fit. AFAIK the only vulture who's tried to take advantage of this state of things is Keith Downey and his psychonavigation label, as discussed above. But besides that, all the other reissues (DSotM, Fires of Ork, Lorenzo Montana, Labyrinth, etc.) are either released by the artists himself, or with their permission.

The biggest problem are really the Inoue albums, as he still seems to be missing, or at least no one is able to contact him, so obviously they can't ask for his permission to reissue them either.

I didn't realise until recently that 2350 Broadway was an actual building. Bretton Hall, which at one time was apparently an artists' collective:

2350 Broadway was the address where Inoue lived in Manhattan. AFAIK all those albums were recorded there, just like the 62 Eulengasse was named after Namlook's home address at the time, where he and Inoue recorded that album.

As far as I know, Tetsu is still alive and well!

Do you have any recent knowledge of his whereabouts? Because as discussed here, his colleagues and label owners have been trying to contact him for years, with no results, so I'm sure they'd be happy for any info you can provide. (His supposed disappearance was even mentioned by Namlook in the liner notes of one of those Ambient Gardener comps, where he speculates Inoue might have died in the 2011 tsunami.)

Has Pete's daughter said anything about the label since his death? I hadn't heard she "chucked the master tapes" -- tho it's not like third generation tapes are all that exist. These were CDs, after all, and pristine recordings would be pretty easily salvaged from existing CDs.

The Inoue records are what I've been listening to these last few weeks -- Electro Harmonix, Shades of Orion 1/2/3, Organic Cloud, Ambiant Otaku, 2350 Broadway I & II, Second Nature. I prefer my FAX when it's super spacey. Would be great if he's okay but I haven't heard anything other than the tsunami rumors either.

Also, this is a great thread (seemingly?) started by Namlook himself on Discogs a few years before he died trying to get the pulse of fans as to what should come next. He explains in some depth what had changed business-wise since the label's heyday and perhaps why things had petered out: https://www.discogs.com/group/thread/629833

I had the impression that MMM didn't know about the Dreamfish reissue until well after it was released so I don't know what that suggests about its status.

which Dreamfish reissue, the rising high edition ?
or has it been reissued since that version ?

No I meant the one that's on Bandcamp but actually I see it originally came out on that label in 2001.

ahh .. was just wondering.
I once saw DF 1, the original FAX cd in Vigin in Leeds and left it cos I had the RH edition.
needless to say, I have never seen it out in the wild since.

I didn't know about the new 2001/2016 reissue of Dreamfish, but since it has the cover art of the '90s Rising High edition, I assume Rising High must've licensed it to that label (Avatar Records), unless they're violating RH's copyright really blatantly? And the original RH edition of Dreamfish certainly was a legit release, didn't RH license it from FAX because Morris was signed to them? (Just like Apollo licensed Fires of Ork, because they were Biosphere's label at the time.)

But yeah, depending on what kind of deal Avatar Records has with RH, it's certainly possible MMM wasn't informed of the Bandcamp release. Though of course that doesn't mean it's a bootleg like those Psychonavigation reissues; they should've been courteous enough to get his approval, but it's perfectly possible they're license contract doesn't necessitate that.

Has Pete's daughter said anything about the label since his death? I hadn't heard she "chucked the master tapes" -- tho it's not like third generation tapes are all that exist. These were CDs, after all, and pristine recordings would be pretty easily salvaged from existing CDs.

No, as far as I know Fabia Kuhlmann hasn't given any statements regarding the label, reissues, or the master tapes. When I said she doesn't seem to be interested in any sort of reissue project, I was merely speculating based on the fact that legit reissues of several FAX collab projects and non-Namlook albums have come out in the last couple of years, but there's been no reissues of Namlook solo records, not even on Bandcamp or anything. I can sort of understand it tho, FAX was (by design) a label with a small, cultish following, and most of the reissues have been of projects with artists (such as Klaus Schulze or Biosphere) who have a larger output and fandom outside FAX, so they have better sales prospects too.

And you're right about the master tape issue, so unless someone wants to remaster them (which Namlook was against, he felt FAX albums sound just fine as they are, and I agree), it shouldn't be a problem using the CDs as a master. Apparently this was exactly what was done with those bootlegs on Psychonavigation Records.

Circling back the past few days to the From Within records, which are available on Hawtin's Soundcloud page. I love how spacey these are ... at times they feel a little like the Orb at their least tongue-in-cheek.

Also, was listening to the second disc of 2350 Broadway I on the drive in to visit a client today ... you can really hear what Uwe Schmidt and Bill Laswell were saying in that Red Bull piece about how Namlook refused to do much in the way of editing or re-recording. There are literally a few points on there were Namlook or Inoue just drop some sound into the mix that distorts horribly and rings forever with that 25-second reverb they're using -- which almost certainly suggests that these records were really just long jams.

Yeah, there's an interview with Move D where he says that he used to go Namlook's house in the countryside, where they did some jamming for a weekend, and Namlook then released the results as the next Move D/Namlook album or two. He also felt they should've rerecorded and edited some of the material, but I guess then we wouldn't have gotten 26 duo albums by the pair. :)

I guess Namlook's background as a jazz guitarist made him feel that releasing the results of jam sessions as such captured something that would've been diminished by further tinkering? It's certainly an uncommon approach in post-80s electronic music, but IMO it works well on some of the long-form, drifting mood pieces, such as on Shades of Orion 2 and 3, and on the best of the Move D/Namlook and Inoue/Namlook material. OTOH, Dark Side of the Moog and some of Namlook's solo albums show that it can also result in fairly boring noodling.

Also, I seem to recall a MMM interview from back in the day, where he says the first Dreamfish album was done in a day?

It's certainly an uncommon approach in post-80s electronic music, but IMO it works well on some of the long-form, drifting mood pieces, such as on Shades of Orion 2 and 3, and on the best of the Move D/Namlook and Inoue/Namlook material.

I was revisiting to Move D/Namlook's Space & Time because of the ambient poll, and yeah, it definitely works here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UPurIZ3FHk

Does anyone know what the differences are between the two Fax Compilations and the first volume of The Ambient Cookbook? I assumed they were exactly the same but in a recent Discogs discussion some people were saying it's a different sequence and, on some tracks, an entirely different edit or mix.

sorry, only have the cookbook so have no idea.

Discogs suggests they’re the same.

'94 to '95 was certainly a special time, as the Fax +49-69/450464 label had more or less shifted its attention from trance records to full on ambient albums.
The American sub-label FAX USA had released FAX Compilation in '94 and then FAX Compilation II in '95, and together the two compilations have identically sequenced tracks as listed here for The Ambient Cookbook.

If anyone cares, I think I have located the source of the confusion: a few artist names differ despite the tracks being identical. "Astralbohrer" is credited to David Reeves on Fax Compilation II but to Otras on the Cookbook. "Talk" is credited on Fax Compilation II to A Day In The Park while the Cookbook credits this same track to The Whole Traffic. And tracks 3 & 4 on Fax Compilation 1 appear to be reversed on the Cookbook. Sorry if this is pedantic, but I can see why this would be confusing.

There's a lot of confusion with the proper artist names on FAX releases, because with the majority of the original CDs, the artist name was the same as the project name, so the two Otras albums were by Otras (not by David Reeves), the Ambient Otaku album was by Ambient Otaku (not Tetsu Inoue); this artist name convention was confirmed by Namlook. However, with some releases there was a separate artist name and album name; for example, Slow and Low, the third Tetsu Inoue album for FAX, was released as Tetsu Inoue. You can check which case is which by looking at the CD spine: if it has only the album name, then the artist name is also the same (minus the album number in multi-album series), but if it has a separate artist name besides the album, then that's the one to use. And to make matters even more confusing, all of the Ambient World reissues put separate artist names on the cover instead of just the project name: so, for example, with the original FAX releases of the 2350 Broadway albums the artist name is 2350 Broadway, but with the Ambient World reissues the artist name is Pete Namlook & Tetsu Inoue. As you can imagine, this has created a big mess on how the albums are credited on Discogs; I've corrected the proper names for CDs, that I own, but some of the names on Discogs are still incorrect.

Wot's uh the deal?

https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music
https://airmusik.bandcamp.com/
https://silencemusik.bandcamp.com/

Hmm...wonder who's behind this? Never heard of Silent State. Glad this stuff is getting out there, in any case

yeah, i picked up on all this stuff this week as well.
from what i have gathered, no-one seems to know re the legit nature of it.
the AIR stuff has been remastered which kind of indicates it has been given the all clear, but who knows.

I'm pretty sure Pete had a daughter, maybe she's involved?

I almost revived this thread last week. When I mistakenly asked Siri to look up 2350 Broadway on Spotify, I noticed that a bunch of Namlook is on there ... is that a recent development?

absolutely.
would like to hope that there is a level of legitimacy of it.
Petes legacy totally needs to be given the TLC it deserves.

xpost.

NTI : this seems to be a very recent development from what i can tell.

I've never really gotten into Namlook - partly because his discography is so bewildering. Looking through the stuff on Spotify and wondering which, like, three things I could start with?

The Ambient Cookbook : a 4 cd collection of the classic early era.
from that collection you will know where to go next.
i.e. all of it.

the two "ambient" things are 'name your own price' on bandcamp and look good and varied

damn, so they are.
well there you go VP.
dive in!

Yikes. Wow. Well, here goes...

My favorite label.

It seems like they had the Dreamfish releasees available but the page has been taken down, so I guess things aren't entirely straightforward with rights, although that's to be expected and the first one is still available on Bandcamp from another label in Israel.

The Silent State Recordings label details naming one Nils Wortmann were entered on Discogs by a shop in Frankfurt.

Really wish more of this was on Spotify.

Well, there’s definitely more of it than I remembered the last time I checked. But it’s a little hard to figure out how much as Spotify doesn’t seem to like when I put “Fax +49-69/450464” in the label search function.

Still, there are a couple of playlists that pop up that give an idea:

https://open.spotify.com/user/s1ckh4nds/playlist/6SJGjTq2cr70mhVqOi9XMl?si=SKMHLwQHSjCkRrAsSDHPUQ

https://open.spotify.com/user/tschak-uk/playlist/32sgvAYsygAL85u0ldSAQ8?si=iqj_lTDQTHGOZIwdwEcN4Q

Really wish more of this was on Spotify.

― groovypanda, Saturday, November 13, 2021 8:24 AM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music
https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music
https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music
https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music
https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music

I was looking for pictures of Pete's studio and came across this interview with Daniel Pemberton. I remember seeing this young kid around those ambient parties, Morris kind of took him under his wing as he says.

https://nmlkfax.blogspot.com/2013/06/daniel-pemberton-interviewed.html

there was a point where it seemed around 50% of all BBC output was composed by Daniel Pemberton.

yeah, i still does me in to think that the daniel pemberton FAX album was made in his bedroom when he was 16.
and it still sounds brilliant.
once of my faves.

actually, in that article i think the 'kevin' he mentions is strictly kev/dj food.

It is, funny he says "this guy called Kevin", although I suppose he was at the time. The first (I think) of those Fish parties was in the Dulwich flat*, later they were in various squatted spaces around Brixton.

* it was Kev, Dave and this guy called Mario who were all still students I think. Dave's art is on things like Morris's 'It's Tomorrow Already' album (and his partner set up the Clear label). Chantal had moved in a bit later, maybe before or around the time of that party I guess.

Now I think about it there was definitely talk of getting Pete Namlook over to play but unless I've a complete memory hole it never happened. Probably hard to get him to spend that much time away from the studio.

still not sure re the legit nature of this new reissue label.
however, all of the seasons releases are now 'name your price' for a limited time.
(something to do re petes birthday apparently .. )
have had spring/autumn and summer for years, was never able to source winter,
so yeah, i am grabbing it ...

https://namlook.bandcamp.com/music

just received word that the fella behind this label has been given the all clear from the Namlook estate.

(i am still not 100% convinced given the complexity of the labels releases to be honest, but hey, grab what you can while its there !)

Dreamfish I and II are back up for €5.

Not on Fax but there is supposed to be a reissue of Mixmaster Morris & Jonah Sharp (+ Haruomi Hosono)'s Quiet Logic album at some point. The opening track is somewhere in the region of School Of Fish and Sharp's Regenz stuff with David Moufang. Which is a very good place to be.

Flying High has supposedly been picked up by WRWTFWW as well.