The Orb are an English electronic music group known for spawning the genre of ambient house. Founded in 1988 by Alex Paterson and KLF member Jimmy Cauty, The Orb began as ambient and dub DJs in London. Their early performances were inspired by ambient and electronic artists of the 1970s and 1980s, most notably Brian Eno and Kraftwerk. Because of their "trippy" sound, The Orb developed a cult following among clubbers "coming down" from drug-induced highs.[1] The Orb has maintained their drug-related and science fiction themes despite personnel changes including the departure of Cauty and other Orb members Kris Weston, Andy Falconer, Simon Phillips, and Andy Hughes. Paterson has been the only permanent member, continuing to work as The Orb with the Swiss-German producer Thomas Fehlmann and later with Martin "Youth" Glover and Tim Bran of Dreadzone.[2] Alex Paterson prides The Orb on manipulating obscure samples beyond recognition in their albums and concerts; however, his unauthorised use of other artists' works has led to disputes with musicians, most notably with Rickie Lee Jones.[3] During their live shows of the 1990s, The Orb performed using digital audio tape machines optimised for live mixing and sampling before switching to laptops and digital media. Despite changes in their performance method, The Orb have maintained their colourful light shows and psychedelic imagery in concert. These visually intensive performances prompted critics to compare The Orb to Pink Floyd.[4] The Orb's critical and commercial success in the UK peaked in the early 1990s with their albums The Orb's Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld and U.F.Orb, which reached #1 on the UK Albums Chart in 1992. This success led to their infamous appearance on Top of the Pops, where they showcased their quirky style by playing chess (an interest of Paterson's since his early youth) while the group's single "Blue Room" ran in the background. The Orb's mid-1990s albums were met with mixed reactions from UK critics; however, their work received praise from American publications such as Rolling Stone. They experimented with vocalists on their next two albums, which critics generally described as bland and uninspired. The Orb then shifted gears to a minimal techno style spearheaded by member Thomas Fehlmann, releasing their new material on the record label Kompakt. Contents History 1988–1990: Paterson & Cauty 1995–2001: Paterson, Fehlmann & Hughes 2004–2007: Paterson & Fehlmann, The Transit Kings Themes and influences Inspiration Drug use Imagery Science fiction and space References External links History 1988–1990: Paterson & Cauty Alex Paterson began his music career in the early 1980s as a roadie for the post-punk rock band Killing Joke, for whom his childhood friend Martin "Youth" Glover played bass.[5] After leaving Killing Joke in 1986, Paterson met future KLF member Jimmy Cauty[6] and the duo began DJ-ing and producing music together under the name The Orb. Paterson and Cauty's first release was a 1988 acid house anthem track, "Tripping on Sunshine", released on the German record compilation Eternity Project One.[7] The following year, The Orb released the Kiss EP, a four-track EP based on samples from New York City's KISS FM.[8] Paterson and Cauty began DJ-ing in London and landed a deal for The Orb to play the chill out room at London nightclub Heaven. Resident DJ Paul Oakenfold brought in the duo specifically as ambient DJs for his "The Land of Oz" event at Heaven.[9] Though The Orb's Monday night performances had only several "hard-core" followers initially, their "Chill Out Room" act grew popular over the course of their six month stay to the point that the small room was often packed with around 100 people.[10] The Orb's performances became most popular among weary DJs and clubbers seeking solace from the loud, rhythmic music of the dancefloor.[11] The Orb would build up melodies using multitrack recordings linked to multiple record decks and a mixer. They incorporated many CDs, cassettes, and BBC sound effects into their act, often accompanied with pieces of popular dance tracks such as "Sueño Latino".[12] Throughout 1989, The Orb, along with Martin Glover, developed the musical genre of ambient house through the use of a diverse array of samples and recordings. The culmination of their musical work came towards the end of the year when The Orb recorded a session for John Peel on BBC Radio 1. The track, then known as "Loving You", was largely improvisational and featured a wealth of sound effects and samples from science fiction radio plays, nature sounds, and Minnie Riperton's "Lovin' You".[13] For its release as a single on record label Big Life, The Orb changed the title to "A Huge Ever Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules from the Centre of the Ultraworld". Upon the single's release, Riperton's management forced Big Life to remove the unlicensed Riperton sample, ensuring that only the initial first-week release of the single contained the original vocals of Minnie Riperton; subsequent pressings used vocals from a sound-alike.[14] Due to these issues, Cauty and Paterson split in April 1990, with Paterson keeping the name The Orb.[15] Also out of these sessions came The KLF album Chill Out, on which Paterson appeared in an uncredited role.[16] Following the split, Paterson began working with Youth on the track "Little Fluffy Clouds". They incorporated samples from Steve Reich's Electric Counterpoint and vocal clips from an interview with Rickie Lee Jones in which she recalls picturesque images from her childhood.[17] While Reich was flattered by The Orb's use of his work,[18] Jones pursued the issue in the legal system.[19] Steve Hillage, whom Patterson had met while DJ-ing in London, also joined as a contributing guitarist. Along with producer Thomas Fehlmann, The Orb completed several additional tracks for their first album, The Orb's Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld.[20] Retrospectively, Adventures is considered ground-breaking for changing the way musicians view sampling and as a seminal work for the genres of ambient and dance music.[21] The completion of Adventures saw the departure of Andy Falconer. Falconer's last contribution was one of The Orb's Peel Sessions. To promote the release of an edited single disc version for an American release, The Orb embarked on their first tour of the United States beginning in Phoenix, Arizona in October 1991.[22] In late 1991 and early 1992, Paterson and Weston wrote their next single, "Blue Room". Assisting with the recording was bassist Jah Wobble, keyboardist Miquette Giraudy, and guitarist Hillage.[23] performance on Top of the Pops where Patterson and Weston played a game of chess in space suits while footage of dolphins and an edited version of "Blue Room" ran in the background.[24] In July 1992, U.F.Orb was released featuring "Blue Room" and, in the US release, The Orb's next single, "Assassin". Weston integrated his technical and creative expertise with Paterson's Eno-influenced ambience on U.F.Orb, combining "drum and bass rhythms" with "velvet keyboards" and "rippling synth lines".[25] Because of this partial anonymity and The Orb's rotating membership, they are often recognised as more of a musical collective than a "band".[26] Over the next year and a half, Paterson and Weston continued to produce new material, but releases stalled when Paterson began to feel that Big Life was trying to dictate the direction of The Orb's music.[27] Their first release on Island Records was the live album Live 93, which gathered highlights from The Orb's recent performances in Europe and Asia. It featured The Orb's live crew of Paterson, Weston, producers Nick Burton and Simon Phillips, as well as audio engineer Andy Hughes, who had stepped in previously when Weston had decided to stop touring.[28] Though Pomme Fritz reached as high as #6 on the UK charts, critics panned it as "doodling".[29] Even Island Records "hated it" and "didn't understand it at all", according to Paterson.[30] 1995–2001: Paterson, Fehlmann & Hughes Following Weston's departure from The Orb, Thomas Fehlmann joined as a full-time studio member, though he would not always participate in live performances. Paterson, Hughes, and Fehlmann then finished producing the album Orbus Terrarum, on which Paterson and Weston had been working. Orbus Terrarum, released in 1995, featured more "earthbound" and "organic" sounds than their previous trippy science fiction themed music.[31] Orbus Terrarum suffered, as Paterson described it, "a good kicking" at the hands of the British press,[32] who described it as "generic" and a low point for Paterson's creativity.[33] Orbus Terrarum alienated many of the group's fans,[34] causing the album to only reach #20 on the UK charts.[35] American critics, however, gave it great acclaim including Rolling Stone who made it their album of the month, citing the album's symphonic flow coupled with The Orb's "uniquely British wit".[36][37] After a long world tour, The Orb, with Andy Hughes and Steve Hillage, settled down to produce their next album, Orblivion—the process of which saw a return to their spacy sounds. Though Orblivion was recorded in May 1996, it was not released until almost a year later, due to Island Records' desire to promote it as a follow up to U2's techno-rock album Pop.[38] Orblivion sold well in Europe as well as the United States, where it reached the Billboard Top 200. The first Orblivion single, "Toxygene", was the highest charting single by The Orb, reaching #4 in the UK on 8 February 1997. Despite high sales, Orblivion received a lukewarm reception from the UK press.[39] As with Orbus Terrarum, Orblivion was better received by American critics, including Rolling Stone, who praised its "contrast of chaos and euphony".[40] Paterson and Fehlmann, along with usual collaborators Hughes, Burton, and Phillips, wrote and produced Cydonia for a planned 1999 release.[41] As Island Records was in a period of restructuring due to its recent purchase by Universal Music Group, Cydonia was not released until 2001.[42] Upon release, critics noted that Cydonia merged together pop, trance, and ambient-dub music, which they felt to be a conglomeration of bland vocals and uninventive ambience that lacked the appeal of The Orb's earlier work.[43][44] NME harshly described it as "a stillborn relic, flawed throughout by chronically stunted ambitions" and describing its only appropriate audience to be "old ravers" seeking nostalgia.[45] Not only did the album receive poor reviews, but The Orb was generally regarded by the UK press as past their prime and an "ambient dinosaur" out of place in the current dance music environment.[46] NME described The Orb's tour as "charming" and that The Orb was "freed from the Floydian pretensions that dogged the band throughout the mid-'90s.[47] The Orb, now composed of Paterson, Phillips and Fehlmann, with guest John Roome, accepted an invitation to join the Area:One concert tour with Moby, Paul Oakenfold, New Order and other alternative and electronic artists.[48] Though The Orb was paired with more mainstream artists during the tour such as Incubus, Paterson and Fehlmann chose to make their next releases a series of several low-key EPs for German label Kompakt in 2002. The Orb found critical success on Kompakt;[49] however, Badorb.com collapsed soon after releasing the compilation Bless You. Badorb.com had released fourteen records over the course of fourteen months from artists including Guy Pratt (Conduit), Ayumi Hamasaki, and Takayuki Shiraishi, as well as The Orb's three-track Daleth of Elphame EP. Though Badorb.com was an internet-based record label, they only sold vinyl releases (with one exception, the aforementioned Orb EP), which Paterson later remarked was a poor idea because "not many people... have record players".[50] Though their musical style had changed somewhat since the 1990s, The Orb continued to use their odd synthetic sounds on 2004's Bicycles & Tricycles,[51] to mixed reviews. The Daily Telegraph praised Bicycles & Tricycles as being "inclusive, exploratory, and an enjoyable journey";[52] however, other publications dismissed it as "stoner dub" and irrelevant to current electronic music.[53][54][55] Like Cydonia, Bicycles & Tricycles featured vocals, including female rapper MC Soom-T who added a hip hop twist to the album.[56] The Orb left Island Records and released the album on Cooking Vinyl and Sanctuary Records. To promote the album, the band began a UK tour with dub reggae artist Mad Professor. Though The Orb still pulled in large crowds, The Guardian noted that they lacked the intensity found in their earlier performances.[57] 2004–2007: Paterson & Fehlmann, The Transit Kings The [[Transit Kings]] performing at The Fringe Festival in [[Dublin]]. After two more EPs on Kompakt, The Orb (now composed of only Paterson and Fehlmann) released Okie Dokie It's The Orb on Kompakt, which featured new material in addition to tweaked versions of their previous Kompakt output.[58] Fehlmann's trademark hypnotic loops and delays made him the center of Okie Dokie production and, according to Pitchfork Media, made it "difficult to say where [Paterson] is in the picture".[59] The Orb's releases with Kompakt gained The Orb back much of their musical credibility with the press and showed that The Orb could "age gracefully".[60] In August 2006, the founders of The Orb - Paterson and Cauty - released Living in a Giant Candle Winking at God, their debut album as the Transit Kings with Guy Pratt and Pratt's associate, Dom Beken.[61] The album featured appearances from The Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr and comedian Simon Day.[62] Beken described Living in a Giant Candle Winking at God as "self-consciously musically written and less sample-based" compared to the members' previous work.[63] Living had been in production since 2001, but due to members' other obligations, it was delayed for several years.[64] while other publications, such as The Times, called it "Orb-lite" and proclaimed it to be "Deep Forest-style sludge".[65] Soon after the album's release, Cauty left the Transit Kings on "extended leave", leaving the project in indefinite limbo.[66][67] The Orb also brought in jazz and house music singer Juliet Roberts[68] and guitarist Steve Hillage.[69] A reunification of Paterson and his long-term collaborator Thomas Fehlmann who last worked together on Okie Dokie It's the Orb on Kompakt, the album was promoted with a launch party with Paterson and Fehlmann performing the whole album live at The-Situation Modern in Clapham, England on 10 September.[70] The 11-track album is said to be the third in the Orbsessions series, although unlike the first two outtakes parts composed of brand new material, recorded at Fehlmann's Berlin studio.[71]. Themes and influences Inspiration The Orb's members have drawn from an assortment of influences in their music.[72] The Orb's central figure, Alex Paterson, had early musical tastes and influences which included King Tubby, Alice Cooper, Prince, Kraftwerk, and T.Rex.[73] Among these, Paterson cites Kraftwerk as one of the most important, claiming they created the foundation from which all modern dance music has been built.[74] though according to Paterson, Eno resents Paterson's use of his music as an influence.[75] however, Paterson has stated that The Orb's music is more influenced by experimental electronic music more so than progressive rock of the 1970s.[76] however, Paterson has strongly rejected the tag, claiming that even as a youth, he was "one of those punks who hated hippies".[77] During production of Cydonia and Bicycles & Tricycles, Paterson's biggest influences were drum and bass and trip hop music, as seen on the tracks "Ghostdancing", "Thursday's Keeper", and "Aftermath".[78] The Orb's more recent influences consist largely of German techno producers, such as Triola, who themselves were inspired by The Orb's earlier work.[79] Drug use As chill out DJs in the late 1980s, The Orb often played to the needs of "the chemical generation" (ravers of the 1980s and 1990s), making music "to come down from drugs to".[80] Imagery The Orb's performances are noted for the use of psychedelic and science fiction images. Imagery has always been an important part of The Orb's persona.[81] This is most prominent during live performances, where The Orb often projects surreal images against onstage screens. Common images include morphing faces, futuristic cityscapes, and ubiquitous alien references.[82] They have long associated their act with absurd symbology with images such as floating pigs.[83] For their next album, The Orb poked fun at their Pink Floyd comparisons with the cover of Live 93 featuring a floating stuffed sheep over the Battersea Power Station, which had appeared on the cover of Pink Floyd's Animals.[84] The artwork found in Badorb.com releases was similar to The Orb's odd artwork of the mid-1990s, as it was stylistically similar and contained little writing.[85] Science fiction and space Some of the more prominent motifs in The Orb's work are outer space and science fiction, including alien visitations, space flight, and mind control. These have included The Orb's use of samples from serious sources such as NASA transmissions to comedic clips from films like Woody Allen's Sleeper. U.F.Orb especially expressed a fascination with alien life with its bizarre sound samples and in the album's title itself.[86][87] Andy Hughes took Weston's place at live performances after the 1993 tour, though Weston did reappear for The Orb's concert at the rainy Woodstock '94.[88] Though The Orb's performances use much onstage equipment and many props, Paterson prefers to present The Orb as "a non-centralised figure of amusement on stage".[89] They hooked synthesisers, such as the ARP 2600, to MIDI interfaces to recreate specific sounds that appeared on their albums.[90] However, The Orb "obliterated it" and reassembled only a few fragments for their remix, much to the chagrin of Jarre, who reportedly refused to release it;[91] Other artists have become agitated due to The Orb sampling their work, though Paterson jokingly suggests that "[t]hey don't know the half of it."[92] The Orb has been a prolific remixing team, having completed over 80 commissioned remixes since 1989.[93] Though Paterson maintains that much of The Orb's remix work is done to support other artists, he admits some of their remixes for major artists were performed so that The Orb could "pay the bills".[94] 2005: Okie Dokie It's the Orb on Kompakt (Kompakt) 2007: The Dream (Traffic Inc., Liquid Sound Design, Six Degrees) (UK #175) 2009: Baghdad Batteries (Malicious Damage)[1] 2010: Metallic Spheres (featuring David Gilmour) References External links Official Website BadOrb.com label Area One video Interview with Alex Paterson and a live performance by The Orb cs:The Orb de:The Orb fr:The Orb nl:The Orb ja:ジ・オーブ pl:The Orb pt:The Orb ru:The Orb sv:The Orb th:ดิออร์บ uk:The Orb

Source: Wikipedia.org