Plateau by Jim Mortimore
Minimal ambient electronica inspired in part by Vangelis' China but also by the usual experimental suspects, including Bernard Hermann's Journey to the Center of the Earth, the title card score for Dr Who: The Ice Warriors (who wrote/performed this haunting piece of library music?) and Sidney Sager's incredible score for Children of the Stones. The idea was to try to capture the feel of ascending a mountain, from the relatively safe plateau, though the storm-lashed death zone, to the somewhat unnerving tranquility of the summit.
Tracklist
| 1. | Plateau / Ascent | 52:46 |
| 2. | Summit | 21:54 |
Credits
The Great Experiment. No - not USS Excelsior - but an attempt to create some music using only one synth. In this case the single oscillator Jen SX100, which was the very first synth I ever bought, back in the late eighties.
The experiment was partially successful - all of the sounds in Plateau/Ascent were created on the Jen and played live with no midi sequencing, except a tiny bit of transistor organ at the beginning. On Summit, the sounds are created on a mixture of the Jen and one VST plugin, the Leto, which is a free Jen emulation - the two exceptions here being a bit of Redtron choir and some arpeggiated twinkliness made from a Roland EP09 electric piano, stuffed rather grievously through some filthy old guitar effects.
The base tracks for Plateau were created somewhere back in the snowy haze that was the early noughties; and the rest was piled somewhat higgledy-piggledy on top during June and July 2013.
Gearlist: Jen SX100; Roland EP-09; Transistor Organ VST; Redtron VST, Leto VST. Analogue FX: 2 x BOSS pitchshift/delay units; BOSS mod-delay, phaser, flanger and chorus. Recordings were made on Reaper. VST plugs: M30 reverb; various delays, autopanners and other scrungy wotnot. Tambourine and ethereal sopranos appear largely uncredited.
Cover scribbles by yours truly, inspired by some wikkid awesome foties of the Himalayas and Saturn wot I skanked from around and about.
License
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I've been writing music since I was very young, having abandoned piano lessons for a Casio VL Tone and two reel2reel tape recorders. I'm inspired by early Tangerine Dream and bleepy radiophonica, such as may be found enhancing 1960s Dr Who. I've written music for BBC Dr Who audio plays and live local performances. Delia Derbyshire, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Jerry Goldsmith are among my muses.