Ellen Allien & Apparat "Orchestra of Bubbles"

I expect this record to be good.

-- just saying dudes (ahem@okgo.com)

riiiight. okgo I'm definitely not excited anymore then ;O)

I don't expect this thread to get lively for at least another couple of months yet anyhow...

!!

Ellen Allien and Apparat playing live in summer 2006

ELLEN ALLIEN AND APPARAT "ORCHESTRA OF BUBBLES" COMING OUT IN APRIL!
ellen allien and apparat collaborated on an album - and "orchestra of bubbles" is really something!
both will go on tour in the summer, so watch out for their gigs!

http://www.ellenallien.de/content/1/img/bubbles_cover.jpg

I'm pretty sure (why??) that this will be o-kay, but sort of dissapointing too, and won't "change my life" and I'm not even trying to build it up to be anything other than a fun Bpitch record. Still more excited about a next Ellen Allien album 'proper' whenever the hell such a thing might come out.

Worst post ever.

Holger Zilske of Smash TV has been co-producer of Stadtkind, Berlinette and Thrills (I'm not sure about the various remix work).

I mean to my ear the Apparat influence (total DSP mastery) is clearly so evident on "Berlinette" and barely at all on the other two, but both the first two records have something of the Smash TV sound in the mastering for sure. Hard & clear, I'd say he's something like the Mark Bell to her Björk(??) thus far. Kind of an enabler to her ideas where she possibly lacks the geek-tech skills to put the final polish on things?

Anyway, she's said in interviews this will be their first true collaboration, with no involvement from outside producers... I see no reason not to take her at her word, especially as she's never denied using a producer/engineer before (so does DJ Hell, so does Roni Size as one particular interview pointedly noted).

I find it hard to judge where she's headiing in her career if she keeps building up her profile at the current rate, some kind of "live" aspect would definitely help her move her music over to a far wider audience... despite her saying she doesn't really want to be "famous" (who would?!) I think she's got incredibly strong commercial instincts, and (this is possibly just my utter deludedness speaking here) creative potential barely touched upon so far. I could totally see her doing something much bigger than "just" DJ-ing.

okay we're probably thinking along similar lines I guess... I might not have gone that far though! Still M.I.A. was on it, why not Ellen?

HELLO ALL CAPS WHAT EXACTLY IS YOUR POINT AND CAN YOU READ OK?

I mean, I have various ideas about the levels of collaboration going on, based on stuff like the differences in micro- vs macro-processing on e.g. Berlinette vs Thrills -- it just doesn't particularly matter to me. And the part that seems notable is that lots of people talk about it in this snippy slanderous way, kinda trying to slide the credit away from her -- not in the normal, casual way we usually talk about, say, what producers rock bands are working with, or whatever. If I said I liked Bjork, I doubt anyone would respond with "Yeah, well, you know a lot of the sound of that one album had to do with Matmos."

(Okay okay I will say one thing about my collaboration-theories. One of the senses I get is that she thinks mostly on the macro level, as on Thrills. And one interesting thing about Berlinette is that it builds tracks from these really intricate drum loops, which don't much change or tweak -- it's like she took four really awesome micro-loops and then immediately jumped to the macro level. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that the loops came from some form of collaboration, as in the "total DSP mastery" mentioned above. The reason this doesn't seem like a significant point to me is that the success or failure of the album still comes from the distinctly-Ellenish macro level: someone else could easily have taken those little loop-machines and made boring hi-tech crap out of them; and conversely, I think most of the album would still be amazing even if you substituted those twitchy little loops for more conventional drum-machine bits. In fact, I think most of the album would still be amazing even if you took all the individual sounds and loops several notches down in awesomeness. And this goes back to the "pop instincts" -- the record functions really well as a pop record, and that's because she really is doing all this amazing work of shaping the tracks, having the right instincts for what could or should go here, what could or should happen there. Getting all into detail over who exactly is providing the perfect digital tweaks to the sound means thinking of the record as some sort of uber-electronic technical record, even though so much of what works about it works on the level of "pop" or "songwriting" or whatever else. I mean, no electronic album is "just" a pile of specially crafted sounds to praise on their craftsmanship -- but if ever there was an electronic record that was particularly not that, Berlinette might be it.)

maybe this 'official' collaboration means that apparat has taken more of a role in the macro vision than previously? it brings to mind pj harvey's 'official' collaboration with john parish in the 90s, even though they'd worked together for years beforehand.

So, like, say what you want about who dialed in the VST settings to create that sweet rolling grind sound in the drum loop at the beginning of "Trashscapes" -- it still seems awfully doubtful that anyone was scripting the harmonies of those verse-words for her. And if there's anything that's common to all of Ellen's stuff (and uncommon among everyone else around her) it's a certain approach to mood/atmosphere that comes way more from the actual melodic and harmonic information than from the "production." You manage to play "Senesucht" for me on an acoustic guitar and I'll still love it.

I think most of the album would still be amazing even if you substituted those twitchy little loops for more conventional drum-machine bits. Indeed! Stadtkind is often still pretty awesome, and that's why I'm reluctant to overweight Apparat's contributions to Ellen's vision (or what you'd call the 'macro' instinct I think) whilst never denying that Ellen made no small usage of whatever drumsounds/synth & max/msp techniques were available on that record, whether they were simply contributed to her or collaborated on between them both.

this is a little bit wrong!

On an unrelated note..
If I said I liked Bjork, I doubt anyone would respond with "Yeah, well, you know a lot of the sound of that one album had to do with Matmos."

I've heard this exact argument, although a lot of quotes from Drew and others have shown it to be false. Bjork has taken on more styles and sounds than most artists while switching collaborators and producers so I could easily see where someone could imagine that each producer is doing most of the work.

On the Ellen front, I'd say that unless someone can cite a specific interview or inside knowledge that I'd assume she's doing a majority share of the work. Allmusic is telling me very little other than crediting one of the Smash TV guys as producer/co-producer on some of her stuff -- I'd speculate that's more for the mixing and mastering side of things.

Sacha Funke and Ellen have never worked on each others material except for remixes afaik.

And yeah, unfortunately the scenario Nabisco doubts is totally, totally common. There are examples on ILM for a start (in the "female electronic musicians?" thread). Some people even give her about the same (tiny) amount of credit Madonna gets... which probably explains why it infuriates me to see history repeating w/r/t Ellen.

The labels sound is hardly as totally homogenous as the acts on Areal ('cept Ada) for instance, nor is it as narrowly focused as some german micro-specialist labels, but still a Bpitch record often manages to have a 'common' sound. It's not unthinkable (or bad!) that there may be some talent pooling going on.

Yep. Nabisco OTM! Obvious point but worth repeating.

Some of us are capable of getting over that... I'd say it's particularly rife in techno circles though, this kind of dismissive attitude.

the most similar argument i can think of--in this type of music--was the one that accompanied the departure of darren emerson from underworld, where it was suggested that he was responsible for their sound and the success of the music, which i thought was bullshit since he hasn't done anything interesting since he left the group and underworld released yet another fantastic album without his help.

I didn't like his further attempts at songcraft on the e.p. that followed much. Whether the new album might produce some successful attempts at that kind of thing (and other kinds of things!) who knows?

I'd be very curious to hear her take on a fully lyrical song with that flat german singing accent of hers (there's a word for this but it's German - "sprech... something") I have SUCH a crush on german female vocals generally now (Ellen, AGF, etc) I should invest in some Ute Lemper records a.s.a.p. really!

apparat and ellen allien album almost finished
Current mood: exhausted

i basically spent the last 2 months fulltime in the studio to finish what ellen and i started during the year. our record "orchestra of bubbles" will be mastered in one week and it´ll be out in early may on bpitchcontrol. 11 tracks - supposed to be a techno album now sounding totally various.

Fandango my compatriot.

anyone got the Fabric RADIO MIX CD* promo to upload? (or just email me thru' here...)

*the ones that don't get sold in the shops, 30 mins long, only 5-8 tracks ish

some cnut outbid me by 50 pence on eBay >:x

where do those fabric radio mix cd's get distributed? managed to pick up the akufen one a long time ago which was great. downloaded the luke slater radio mix which was very dull.

would like to get my hands on the ellen a mix myself...

fandango: http://www.mediafire.com/?3aiy3zfwlml

lucas you are a gent :) thank you!

‘Boogy Bytes Vol. 4 - Mixed by Ellen Allien’ in march 2008

New Album called ‘Sol’ in the summer 2008

:)

love this album.

Listened to it 2 days ago, it really is fantastic.

On the playlist here, too. Superb walking-around-in-winter music.

I was also thinking how great "Do Not Break" would sound in hip-hop mix/as a hip hop beat etc.

i think this album is my favorite from either artist.

There is a great dubstep-y song on this disc. Metric, maybe?

Tracklisting for Boogybytes 4:

01 Agf - Liniendicke
02 Vera - In The Nook
03 Ricardo Villalobos & Patrick Ense - Fizpatrick
04 Melon - Nitzi (In My Mind, So Fine)
05 Andres Zacco & Lucas Mari - Carbonela“ (Seph's Vidrionela Rmx)
06 Konpiùta - Christmas Fairytale“ (Moessap Edit)
07 Sozadams - Eyes Forlon
08 Richard Seeley - Juicy Vermin
09 Lucio Aquilina - My Cube
10 Melchior Productions - Don Juan
11 Friendly People - Music Is Improper“ (Martin Buttrich Rmx)
12 Sascha Funke - Double Checked
13 Gaiser - Withdrawal
14 Kassem Mosse - A1
15 Little Dragon - Twice

'Boogybytes Vol.4' is released on BPitch Control on March 31, 2008

***

I'm still waiting for a return to form after her excellent 'Weiss Mix' (2002). Neither 'My Parade' or 'Fabric 34' did very much for me.

no, neither did.

she's coming to seattle for the first time 5/1 and i don't want the world to hurry up but i also can't wait

my favourite bit on the whole album may be when the bass drops on 'Under'

it's all about 'jet'.

enjoying this today, weeping along to "rotary" ... what happened to the old me that was too happy-go-lucky for this kind of music, i wonder

I have been playing the fuck out of this over the past week, it's fucking monstrous.

Metric still kills.

"way out" and "jet" iirc

gotta put this on again soon

turbo dreams/way out/jet/do not break

v possibly my favourite dance album of the 00s, so many great memories

SHRINKING WORLD
DRY LAKES---

This is still lovely.

this is some seriously good shit, slightly below berlinette, which is flawless imo

the Apparat RA mix that went up in the past days or whatever made me return to "Orchestra of Bubbles." i'd sort of thought of Ellen as a bit of a joke after what i considered flat efforts (plus the whole going into fashion disaster thing that i hated) of the past few years....

but jesus, now i remember why i played this album so much in 2006. it is fucking awesome.

I don't think I ever heard this. Should probably fix that.

i've listened to it a couple times in the past week, i really really like it.

really enjoying apparat's new album: apparently originally intended as a soundtrack to a stage version of war & peace?!

http://www.thefader.com/2013/02/08/stream-apparats-krieg-und-frieden-album/

Hadn’t heard it in 10 years but - man - this album is just the greatest

all timer

liking what I heard of Apparat's latest too

Weird how Ellen Allien kinda wasted away her career after that. I remember a indie rockish album a couple of years later and that was …it?

She has kept working as a dj and still releases albums every 4 years or so, but I agree, after Berlinette and this album it seemed like she was on a different, more interesting path than what we ended up with.

Berlinette and this album are total classics though.

Thrills is her magnum opus for me. Such a beast of a record

still listen to this plenty often, a classic

Ellen took a series of experimental left turns after Orchestra of Bubbles, which is great in theory, but she didn't really nail any of them. The austere SOOL took a lot of time to get into, but was quite engaging when you did, and then Dust, the album with the shoegaze-y guitars, was preceded one of her most annoying songs, 'Flashy Flashy'.

LISm, a single track with drones and industrial noises produced for a dance performance also wasn't designed to bring back the Berlinette punters to the fold. Don't think I ever heard the last three, Nost, Alientronic and AurAA, which emerged in relatively quick succession from 2017-2020, but she's still very active as a DJ.

I do not care for “metric” (dubsteppy thing ruins the vibe) or “leave me alone” (too much apparat, too syrupy) but the rest of the album is incredible

WAY OUT
ROTARY
DO NOT BREAK
EDISON

^the top jams imo

i still listen to 'way out' 20 times a day

this was such a big album and this minimal, glitchy sound was everywhere in the mid-00s and yet it feels like it's completely overlooked today.

Allien's pivot into big-room trance-influenced techno of late is fun in a mindless hedonistic way but I miss the sense of personality and singularity from this era.

WAY OUT
ROTARY
DO NOT BREAK
EDISON

^the top jams imo

― brimstead, Monday, 3 April 2023 02:10 (six hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

come on, JET!

Weird how Ellen Allien kinda wasted away her career after that. I remember a indie rockish album a couple of years later and that was …it?

― licorice oratorio (baaderonixx), Sunday, April 2, 2023 3:48 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

her account was recommended to me based on other follows on instagram and she appears to be doing dj gigs on multiple continents and seems to be doing well!

boxedjoy otm on the recent mixes. looks like she did a beats in space mix in january that looks a little more varied, though

been craving Berlinette lately, went to Bandcamp, the digital costs more than the CD!!! WTF who does this?

someone trying to clear out their storage space full of unsold product, probably

I would think that, but the CD is 17 euros and the digital is 17.69, so baffling

meanwhile they are like $10 shipped in the US on Discogs, guess I'll go that route

lmao did you see how much the shipping for the cd is from germany? the digital is a bargain!

I really enjoyed all her albums up until Lism. It’s frustrating that most of Nost and all of Alientronic are so full of cold/dreary/grayscale techno monoliths. Feels like she purposely excised all her personality out of those records. Auraa was way better and felt like a low key successor to Thrills, it had more light/ variation/life to it. I guess she has sort of given up on albums as of now.

Nothing brings out the uber-cringe more than reading some of my older enthusiastic(!!) dance music posts on here lol. I think it's being more self-aware and ok with the auty introvert outsider tendency in play, and how reliant I was on the internet for discovery in a way, I may be *slightly* less so now.

Can see how the whole club-but-not-quite, somewhat packaged, but also cheeky but not jokey (more fun than being amongst anoraks debating "proper techno" anyway) Bpitch vibe appealed to someone who hadn't really lost it hardcore (or fitted in) in a club for years on end like some, essentially, a dabbler. Who also totally missed the original "summer of love" ffs. But did make it to Berlin (cool) briefly I guess haha.

Weirdly I've totally gone clubbing mad again last couple years but more seeking out weird disco/house in tastes mostly.

None of which is relevant, I really liked SOOL/LISM and NOST (some) I liked the breadth of putting something different out every time. The indie one and the others though I just couldn't crack, didn't work for me. Did someone above already say painted into a corner? Kind agree.

I think Ellen DJ's maybe a bit outside my interests these days too, not followed in some time.

Boxedjoy upthread said "completely overlooked" I kind of think it's because it was completely overground by the time it came out, amongst the contemparies of this sub-scene... hidden in plain sight I guess as it's not something "diggers" are gonna pull out if those of a certain age are already over-familiar.

It's so weird/refreshing when you get a track from around this particular era in a mix now... lots of still great music but very out of fashion/time currently?

'scuse the paragraph, not posted in a million years.

I hear a lot of the Villalobos and Perlon sound in sets from the likes of Shanti Celeste, Ben UFO et al, and I think Modeselektor are secretly the most influential act of the Festival Bass sound of 2025, but the glitchy "IDM techno" sound of BPitch and similar feels ripe for revival still, at least in the orbit of dance music I'm listening to

I guess she has sort of given up on albums as of now.
Looks like it. I think her focus is on the UFO label and We Are Not Alone club nights and compilations - as well as the DJing obviously. That said, Ellen still drops a great tune every now and then. I'm really enjoying "How It Looks Like" from the ICARIUS Vol.2 comp (also now a stand alone digital single).