The Music of the Spheres

From IC dance clubs and jam sessions to warp-inspired music mixes and suggested-listening for particular attractions, music seems to be a big part of how we characterize the environments on Puzzlebox. What sorts of music do you think go with what warps (Or other large-scale Mess features)?

(For more general suggestions, see Media Resources/Music.)

Up

• Yes, Up has music. Very introspective music, notes and instruments and timing set just so that if you keep listening, you find yourself drawn into it, analyzing the placement, marveling as it travels deeper and deeper into the beautiful fractal patterns formed and drawn along with each note...
  • Possible examples: Brian Eno's classic ambient works (in particular Music For Airports and Thursday Afternoon). J.S. Bach, Philip Glass, Steve Reich. -- Amanita
• Analog classic synth from the 1970's, like Wendy Carlos, Robert Moog, and Terry Riley. Experimental composers like John Cage. Boards of Canada. Laurie Anderson. American Analog Set. -- OR
• XOR's player describes I Am Robot And Proud's music as "soundtrack for growing up in a social democracy". Warm, innocent, and bleepy. -- XOR
• Progressive/art-rock bands of the 1960s-'70s: Yes, Moody Blues, Genesis, Alan Parsons Project, Procol Harum, etc. Tricky eclectic music that makes you concentrate; philosophical lyrics that make you think. And I bet there's a sect devoted entirely to mixing and mastering Beach Boys bootlegs to produce The Perfect Smile Album. (Brian Wilson's recent solo album, being entirely newly recorded, is imperfect by default.) -Talib

Down

• Surely Tweek's powernoize would get a mention. One can also encounter tribal beats (the Gridshamans), or perhaps one hears the music in the clangs and bangs of the factories (the Eisenstimmen). All of it, however, is likely to share the common trait of not really being organized, per se; just lots of chaotic notes and riffs and ideas flowing together into something that does a good job of imitating a cohesive whole.
• Trip-hop. KLF. Underworld. Deltron. Intelligent hip-hop like Deltron 3030 and A Tribe Called Quest. Patti Smith. The Clash. Dead Kennedys. Gary Numan. Stereolab. The Residents. Avant-garde noise rock. Anything with a dissonant, improvisational, jarring sound. -- OR
• Those who embrace the Warp-dualism philosophy enjoy riffs at Upwarpian culture, an example of which is ["Fitter Happier"] by Radiohead.
• Fela Kuti. Faust. Luigi Russolo, the Italian Futurist: ["The art of noises"]. Wall Of Voodoo (mostly Stan Ridgway/Joe Nanini era). Recent King Cobb Steelie. -- Amanita

Top

• Individual musical styles will vary highly based on the society or club, but it is usually safe to assume that music is of a restrained, polite and proper form. Think string quartets, ballroom piano, et cetera. Music is for purposes of entertaining guests; it would be downright vulgar to keep it to one's self.
• More broadly, courtly music from anywhere: 18th-century Europe, Japanese gagaku and noh, Indonesian gamelan music...
• Bossa nova. French cafe pop. Komeda (both Krzysztof and the band named after him). "Cool," formalistic jazz, like Brubeck and Monk. The Cocteau Twins? Pizzicato Five before they got into hip-hop. Moody, romantic, elegant things. I disagree about music being an entirely public pursuit in Top; there are some emotions it is only proper to entertain before oneself or a lover. -- OR
• Classical guitar, gypsy music -Talib

Bottom

• Boom-chicka BOW WOW! uns uns uns uns...
• The B-52's, absolutely. 1960's psychedelic rock. Janis Joplin. Jimi Hendrix. Stoned jam bands that play for 54-hour stretches without realizing it. The Doors. The entire Woodstock soundtrack. Bossa nova. French cafe pop. (Same as Top. Make of this what you will.) Steely Dan sleazery. Certain Frank Zappa. Trancey, mideastern-tinged surfrock. Morcheeba. The Supreme Beings of Leisure. Pizzicato Five after they got into hip-hop. -- OR
• The Electric Prunes. The Blossom Toes. The Chocolate Watch Band. The Jellybean Bandits. The Lollipop Shoppe. The Neon Philharmonic. The Peanut Butter Conspiracy. (all real bands) -- OR
• Folk songs about cuckoo's nests. Randy jazz and blues tunes sung by sly hustlers and great big take-charge gals. -- Amanita

Charm

• Light, upbeat, simple and happy. Listen with love.
• OR pointed out a group that seems to fit here once, tho I've lost the link... --g0

Was it Twink, the toy-piano band? -- OR

[Fine choice]. I'm sure [Lemon Jelly] and [Mr Scruff] have adherents too. -Talib

• Juicy Panic. Boards of Canada. Joy Electric. Most of the Sushi 4004 Shibuya-kei compilation. -- OR
• Regenerator - Echo

Strange

• Coiling, obsessive, romantic-psychotic. The more you listen, the more you find yourself wound down into depression, up into the pure ecstasies of total feeling without regard for safety or sanity, or out into the empty spaces between stars (the Goldfrapp Remix of the song 'Halo' by Depeche Mode).
• Nine Inch Nails, Wolfshiem (not all Strangers are evil, they're just Strange!), Within Temptation, Evanescence, insane voodoo swing for where Strange gets close to Bottom, gothic-industrial, gothic-punk, goth rock. Self-awareness, so some Gary Numan here too.
• Coil. Portishead. Lamb. Koop. Dead Can Dance. Scandinavian black metal: the more turgid and adolescent, the better. -- OR
• Angsty industrial music: Rammstein, Funker Vogt, Melotron, KMFDM. And probably telling the younger Strangelings to turn down that Limp Bizkit/Linkin Park/Nickelback/Puddle of Mudd/Evanescence/etc. trash. -Talib
• Legendary Pink Dots. Wire. Merzbow.