Once More For The First Time Again, Again Dept. Thirty Minutes Beyond The Blue Horizon (Version 5.0)

On my meditative strolls around th' IoF© I often stumble across forgotten albums lurking shyly in the lush undergrowth (join me by pounding that Random Post button), but sometimes an album I'm pretty sure is here turns out to be completely buried in the golden sands of the comments. Just such an album is one that is very dear to my heart, and one which I've recently reworked. If you've read the title to this piece you may already have a pretty sharp idea what album I'm taking about. If you didn't, take this opportunity to scroll up a little and read it. If you simply do not have the time for that, simply read to the end of this sentence: it's Thirty Minutes Beyond The Blue Horizon, which some of you may have stashed away in your underpants drawer. But not this version, which is V. Or 5. Some big changes, a few small, but all exquisitely nuanced, adding a new dimension of sound to an already overwhelming audio experience! I'm posting this mainly for my own satisfaction [like everything else you do - Ed.], because I want it to be honored with its own FoamFeature™, because it's so very special. At least to je. Ax me why!

Random Four Or Five Guy©: Say, Farq, for why is this album so very special and so very dear to your heart? Huh? Hoo hah?

FT3: Gee, Random Four Or Five Guy©, thanks fer axin'! Full story after this message from our sponsor!

Ten cents off first order with this coupon!

 

FT3: Thanks for that, MrDave! Okay! Let's get stuck into the screed that no-one needs to read! 

TMBTBH is a concept piece, an immersive mind-movie, if you will, that takes as its lofty theme man's search for contentment as exemplified by the dream of the exotic, a mythic heavenly refuge right here on earth. This dreamed-of place has had many names, some of them embedded in the recording, Atlantis, Eldorado, Avalon, Mu, Xanadu, Shangri-La. But let's break up this TL-DR text with a pitcher of a Washington, DC drug store [head shop - Ed.] in 1942:

James Hilton's novel Lost Horizon was a childhood favourite, and gets re-read on a regular basis. Written before every square inch of this earth was spied on in real time by thousands of satellite eyes, it's at once a spiritual fable and a thriller. The possibility of his Shangri-La existing in physical form may have been a dream, but there was always the chance that somewhere over the lost horizon, beyond the rainbow, remained untouched by the monstrous clawing horror of Western civilisation. Now, of course, we know better. Pretty much everywhere's a shit-hole, and the spirit of exploration that drove men to the ends of the earth has been poisoned by TikTok tourism; every "exotic" locale relegated to a selfie background. It's a two-dimensional world of theatre flats lacking only your smiling self in the foreground. The exotic is dead, the familiar breeds contempt for the earth and its people. Sit in the lap of the Buddha and grin for the camera. Pose in front of the Dachau gate. Disneyland is Shangri-La.

So what's the dreamer to do? Switch off your phone. Take off your watch. Go for a walk without telling anyone where you're going because you don't know yourself. Lie on your back on some blue hillside and gaze at the clouds. Be alone, and forget about "sharing" your experience. Search for your own Shangri-La. Keep it secret.

Some notes on the recording:

Shawn Phillips, from the failed remake of Lost Horizon, blended with Tomita's Bermuda Triangle. At the 16 second mark, note an odd little sound cluster. Working with Audacity (the program I use for these exercises) is mainly visual - you're staring at waveforms of samples, and have to remember what they are. This little cluster of notes/sound, maybe a couple of seconds long, was an accidental overdub offcut. I have no idea of the sources. It's like the song of an unknown bird. It's embedded it at several points throughout the half hour.

"A haven of peace and beauty ..." That's James Hilton himself, who reappears at the end.

Shawn Phillips segues perfectly into Mu, Merrell Fankhauser's unlikely Maui combo. The eyes he saw watching over us weren't Elon Musk's. The myth of Mu is based on English eccentric James Churchward's pleasantly bonkers books.

Israel "IZ" Kamakawiwoʻole's version of  Somewhere Over The Rainbow. Yes, I know we all cringe at the song and gee whiz, is this guy carrying some extra weight around. But (and yes, it's a big one) the song is important because it expresses exactly the yearning the whole 30 Minutes is built around. Like all the other core songs used, it's edited down to a bare minimum, and treated to some sonic trickery, overdubs and segues. IZ's version is notable for reclaiming the song from its overblown show tune origins. He ignores the drama-queen octave leap in Somewhere, singing in an unforced, intimate style over simple ukulele accompaniment. It's a radical reworking that works.

Sopwith Camel's Oriental Fantasy, blended with samples from the soundtrack of the original (and superb) Lost Horizon movie with Ronald Coleman. Hallucinatory monks, clashing untuned cymbals. Then Billy Cobham banging the gong that should lead into the Between Nothingness And Eternity album but here is edited into the opening of John McLaughlin's Freedom One (or possibly Two). Note reappearance of Mystery Sound Cluster. I think we deserve a pictorial break, so here's a pitcher of a monk blessing my truck:

Mongolian music, featuring the throat singing that used to sound so exotic (remember how you felt on first hearing the sitar?), blended into Yma Sumac, into a strange violin-led piece I can't remember anything about, and possibly some more Mongols under the sound of the prop plane carrying Ronald Coleman to Shangri-La. South Sea Island harmonies, more Lost Horizon soundtrack (plus Mystery Sound Cluster), leading into Mike Nesmith's perfect rendition of Beyond The Blue Horizon. Polynesian chants, a brief snippet from ELO's Eldorado, and we're diving into the depths of sub-marine dub with Sly n' Robbie. Seagulls and sea, Shawn Phillips soars over Bali Hai, and at the surf's edge we find the Beach Boys' Little Pad, and the impossibly exotic beauty of Dorothy Lamour [below - Ed.], who sings Moon Of Manakoora straight, and seductively. Wotta dame.

Oh my.

 

(I've avoided anything "exotica", the Martin Denny genre. I know it has some fans, but I ain't one of them. I prefer going to the source of his tourist snapshots, or finding the exotic hidden in the familiar.)

Van Dyke Parks' Song Cycle is mined for some samples, interwoven with Bali Hai and Mongolian twang, and some temple weirdness whose origin I shamefully forget. Things get blissful with Steve Hillage's Rainbow Dome Music, and back-masked strings whose origin is lost in time. Mystery Sound Clusters, and Judy notices we're not in Kansas any more. The last minute is layered from Tomita, rowboat sound effects, Hilton's voice, and a fade suggesting this could be the start of something else ...

TMBTBH will provide a truly immersive soundscape which transports you, for a little while, into a pleasantly dreamlike state, without becoming dull or uninvolving (like I find a lot of ambient music). I listen to it a lot (but then I would, wouldn't I?). Headphones or earbuds are the best, and you will need that uninterrupted half hour alone. Before sleep and on waking are good. I hope you get a glimpse of Shangri-La. It's still there. Somewhere over the lost horizon, beyond the rainbow!

 

Some notes on the cover image:

That's the Lost Island Of Wherever, another iteration of Shangri-La, which was an isolated island surrounded by land. The surfacing diver is being reborn into paradise, out of the dark amniotic sea into the bright air. Up through the foam of memory, forgetfulness. Paradise means, literally, the Garden of Eden, a universal idea appropriated by Christianity. That tended plot behind your house is a model, unconscious or otherwise, of the innocence we have lost, and may yet regain.

This has been an unusually serious piece. If you read it, thank you. I hope you enjoy the music. Normal service resumed as soon as possible!