2016 four CD set. Two years in the making, Close To The Noise Floor is a 61-track set exploring the origins of electronica in the UK. Featuring tracks from key figures on the cassette label underground alongside early releases by future stars of the movement, this is part primitive rave, part synthesizer porn and part history lesson. Enthralled by the mysterious electronics of Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Gong and German Kosmische artists such as Tangerine Dream, Harmonia and Cluster, and inspired by the DIY ethos of punk, a quiet revolution took place across the UK in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The rise of the microchip and the advent of affordable synthesizers enabled countless artists for whom guitars, drums and bass had become old hat, and in grubby bedsits, unremarkable living rooms and art school halls across the British Isles, UK electronica was born. The underground, fueled by cassette exchanges, co-operative vinyl compilations and a thriving mail order network, quickly began to stretch the boundaries of sonic experimentation. Close To The Noise Floor explores every corner of this fascinating and often overlooked chapter in our musical history. For proto synth-pop look no further than 100% Manmade Fibre and Spoon Fazer, whilst British Standard Unit and Five Times Of Dust lay out techno templates which wouldn't take full form until many years later. Elsewhere, the synthesizer laden ambient music of Zorch and the found sound collages of A Tent sit comfortably alongside early forays by familiar names - Blancmange, The Human League, OMD and Throbbing Gristle - in over four hours of futurist, entirely modern music.

Tracklist:

Computer Bank - Five Times of Dust
R.A.M. - the Klingons
Re-Education Through Labour - Chris and Cosey
Sedation Strokes - Malcolm Brown
Little Bob Minor - Storm Bugs
Tight As a Drum - Thomas Leer
Holiday Camp - Blancmange
Fractured Smile - Inner City Static
Sexuality - We Be Echo 1
God with Us - Bourbonese Qualk 1
Faith - Nagamatzu 1
Disco Song - O Yuki Conjugate 1
Optimum Chant - British Electric Foundation 1
All Night Long - Kevin Harrison 1
Stopping and Starting - Voice of Authority 1
I Am Your Shadow - Colin Potter 1
D'ya Think I'm Sexy - British Standard Unit 1
The Single Off the Album - Five Times of Dust 1
Back to Beginning - Spoon Fazer 2
Gerry and the Holograms - Gerry and the Holograms 2
Drugface - the Passage 2
A New Kind of Man - John Foxx 2
Green for Go - 100% Manmade Fibre 2
Sentimental - Those Little Aliens 2
Protect and Survive - Final Program 2
Being Boiled - Human League 2
New Muzak - Instant Automations 2
Materialistic Man - Cultural Amnesia 2
(Leaving Me) Now - Worldbackwards 3
Music to Save the World By - Alan Burnham 3
Almost - Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark 3
Kodak Ghosts Run Amok - Eyeless in Gaza 3
Broken Vein - Schleimer K 3
The Distance from Koln - Native Europe 3
Adrenalin (Return of the Elohim PT 1) - Zorch 3
Robot Dance - Sea of Wires 3
Sea of Tranquility - Ron Berry 3
Mistral - MFH 3
Joe Goes to New York - Adrian Smith 4
Embryo (Extract) - Mark Shreeve 4
Tripych - Eg Oblique Graph 4
Encounter - Carl Mathews 4
Ynys Scaith - Paul Nagle 4
Sedation - O Yuki Conjugate 4
Western Vein - Konstruktivist 4
Dead of Night (Excerpt) - Attrition 4
What a Day - Throbbing Gristle 4
No Way of Knowing - a Tent 4
Go for the Throat - Portion Control 5
Eco Beat - DC3 5
Dying Inside - Renaldo and the Loaf 5
In the Army - Blah Blah Blah 5
God Speed - Legendary Pink Dots 5
Muslin Gauze Muslim Prayer - Muslimgauze 5
Live at Longborne - Suisse 5
Menial Disorders, Extract B2 - Alien Brains 5
Himeal (And She Blew) - Storm Bugs 5
In the Room - Third Door from the Left 5
Dignity of Labour - Al Robertson 6
Mzui (Extract) - Bcgilbert, Glewis, Russell Mills

UPC: 5013929102491
Label: Cherry Red
Release Date: 5.6.16
Format: CD

Close To The Noise Floor Formative Uk Electronica - Close to the Noise Floor: Formative UK Electronica (CD)