Infinity of Space blog 4 – hooked to the silver screen

While there still remains a countless number of classic science fiction novels just waiting to be turned into breathtaking films, in recent years, science fiction in cinema has undergone a long overdue healthy revival – and has finally started to regain some credibility. Granted, while ever we have big, gushing Hollywood endings, us literary SF fans will always be left groaning and preferring to stick to our books – but there’s no denying the fact that we are also seeing more contemporary adaptations and original ideas hitting the big screen, such as The Martian, Arrival and Passengers along with all the creativity and work that goes into making these visual feasts.

With the welcome return of the Star Wars franchise and successful rebooting of Star Trek in recent years as well as films like Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, space travel on the silver screen has never looked more epic and exciting. Taking the crowning glory, was Christopher Nolan’s masterful Interstellar, which perhaps remains the most impressive and believable SF film in a long, long time.

The spacecraft designs on Interstellar were superb and credible, both to the mind and the eye – Nolan abandoned the commonplace CGI onslaught, favouring scale models and impressive sets – and the whole thing was utterly believable. But for me, what made Interstellar such an emotional watch, was Hans Zimmer’s wonderful soundtrack.

Hans Zimmer knows how to pull off a perfect soundtrack and his work on Interstellar was no exception, proving that sometimes, simplicity is the most effective. Zimmer’s score was also very different to the typical orchestral or electro-symphonic soundtracks associated with modern SF films. I never imagined just a few simple church organ notes would have such a profound effect.

With the likes of the new Star Wars and Star Trek films, there was also that warm sense of nostalgia – in some ways looking back in order to look forward. But certainly for my generation, these films do a great job of reaching in to your inner child and reprising that sense of wonder and amazement that we all felt when we saw them at the cinema or home video the first time round.

I continually applaud director J.J.Abrams’ faithfulness to original designs and ideas – with The Force Awakens and Star Trek, today’s filmmaking technology has realised brilliant new visions, but Abrams deliberately chose to remain true to all those crucial elements and design aesthetics that made the original counterparts so successful. In short, these films, and the starships with which we’re all so familiar have transported us beyond the stars from the comfort of the cinema seating in the most impressive ways seen to date.

In the 1990s, the only space-based SF film that caught my attention was Event Horizon, and even looking back to the 1980s, the only strong contender after the Star Wars films was perhaps Disney’s The Black Hole. We’ve finally reached an era when once again science fiction film has taken its rightful place, providing fantastic adventure, escapism and inspiration.

Of course the music always plays such a huge role in the cinematic experience of these films, and this is of course, another inspiration to my own work, especially when composing an album that is designed to evoke images of space and space travel.

When composing Infinity of Space, the imagery of many of these films (and more) was often in my mind – or in many cases, sitting on my bookshelf in lovely books of concept art. But what a rich source of inspiration! When I’m watching a film, there’s nearly always a part of my brain that’s listening to the music and assessing it, while another part of me is trying to imagine what kind of music I would make for a certain scene. So while the fantasy of scoring your own cinematic soundtrack may appear rather grandiose, when working on an album with a specific theme, it really is an ideal influence.

Infinity of Space will be my fifth release in support of the Initiative for Interstellar Studies, and another interpretation of the Initiative’s ethos and mission as well incorporating the decades of space travel and science fiction influence that still drive its members’ passion today.

Below is an excerpt from Construct, one of the album’s darker and more dramatic tracks. The title comes from the idea of a huge spaceship under construction out in space – huge and dark, just hanging in the air, thunderously being assembled by man and machine, like a floating hive of industry.

Infinity of Space is out now via Bandcamp:
https://thelightdreams.bandcamp.com/album/infinity-of-space

Music for the stars

I have associated a certain type of music with visions of space and other planets since I was a child. This is what led to me creating my own instrumental electronic music, despite having little in the way of formal training.

An artist at heart, when I first started experimenting with music a decade ago, I soon realised that for me, it was the same as painting – only using sounds instead of colours. But as a synesthete, for me, the sounds I use do have colours and textures. Of course, a degree of technical knowledge is required, as well as a basic musical understanding, but to me, making music feels very much like the same creative process, only with a different medium and result.

In 2012 when I was invited to become first Honorary Musician for the Initiative for Interstellar Studies (i4is), I jumped to the opportunity to be a part of an exciting new organisation with such a passionate and ambitious vision. To be able to promote such a forward thinking vision through my music was the ideal project brief.

To date, I have released four albums in support of i4is:

Future Worlds / Future Worlds Redux

An album based around different visions of the future, from utopias to dystopias, deep space travel and a climate-changed Earth. This was very much an album inspired by classic SF writing such as Arthur C. Clarke, etc. I revisited the album creating the Redux version that was entirely symphonic.

Beyond the Boundary

This album was designed to tie-in with the Initiative’s book of the same name (to which I also contributed a chapter). I have always wanted to make a space travel concept album, and this is it; starting with the mission launch and culminating in a journey into the unknown.

Panorama

If Beyond the Boundary was the journey, then this is the destination. Panorama is music for cinematic vistas and the exploration of alien landscapes. The subtle concept at the core of the album was the discovery of an Earth-like planet.

But how do you make “space music”?

The kind of music that evokes visions of space for me, may not do so for everyone. If you’re not keen on electronic music, then my stuff maybe isn’t for you. But if you’re keen to put styles and genres aside, then the music – being instrumental – should be totally open to interpretation. Granted, I present the albums with an initial concept, but once it is out there, the listener can take it as they wish. 

I’ve always been inspired by space art – hence becoming an artist myself. The work of artists such as David A. Hardy, John Berkey, John Harris, Chris Moore, Chris Foss and Tim White are some of my favourites. Their work takes you to places… the kind of pieces that make you want to step inside the frame and explore. This particular generation of artists have produced incredibly prophetic and visionary pieces, which still resonate and inspire today, and I always look to this work for inspiration – musically and artistically.

And I’m sure my version of synaesthesia helps me decide what sounds to choose; what colours they evoke in my mind, as I’m building up my soundscapes. And in the case of the albums I have produced for i4is, then I’ll look to their own mission statement.

I try to imagine the sights you might see on such a mission and the range of emotions experienced at gazing upon something you’ve never seen or even been able to conceive seeing before. This kind of feeling was particularly well presented in Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar – that moment when we first lay eyes on the black hole Gargantua.

Another inspiration is how we’ve recently been able to see the surfaces of Mars and Pluto in vivid detail like never before. This sort of thing leads to me exploring various sounds and atmospheres, and seeing what seems to match whatever I’m looking at. It feels very much like creating a soundtrack in that respect.

But it also needs to play like an album of music to be enjoyed, concept aside. So the real challenge is trying to make something that is heavily atmospheric and thought provoking, at the same time as having some sort of musical integrity. And in the case of the above albums, they need to be worthy of their particular audience’s attention.

So with each album comes a new challenge, and also during each project, new things are learned and discovered. With every album I’ve produced, there’s always a sense of progression, whether musically or technically. So with that thought in mind, I very much look forward to starting work on the next album of interstellar music for i4is…

All of the albums mentioned in this blog (and many more) can be streamed and purchased (in digital format) from my Bandcamp site.

Pushing backs against the grain

One thing David Bowie’s music taught me was to be honest in your creativity.

David’s work, outlook and creative processes have been the best art and music teaching I could have ever wished for. In addition to his music, his creative approach and his thinking still inspire me to this day, and will continue to do so.

I’ve always cited Bowie as an influence on my own music, but it is perhaps less evident, with my work being instrumental. But the atmospheres and textures of his music on albums such as Low are often what caught my attention, and that seamless integration between his music and its associated visuals – the videos, his personas and album cover artwork.

One thing that David said during a 1997 interview with Alan Yentob, was, “If you’re really turned on by what you’re doing, there’s bound to be other people out there who like it.” This really resonated with me, and as a self-taught musician, I’ve found it to be very true.  

I also shamelessly admit to borrowing that phrase, as it has become a creative motto to me. It has always been at the back of my mind whenever I publish a new piece of artwork or music. It no longer matters if I’m not the most accomplished player or whatever – I’m the best I can be, doing my best at this particular moment. And quite simply, if I like it, others will too. What more encouragement could you ask for? And I’m not sure I would have ever thought that way without those words from Bowie.

In another interview, David once described himself as “the ultimate recycler”, and I think that it true of any artist and creativity in general. You absorb your surroundings and influences, then reshape and repurpose them in your own way.

A week ago, I was still digesting Blackstar – this exciting new album from David Bowie, with no inclination – like everyone – of the nigh-on impossible to accept news that would be just around the corner.

“If I never see the English Evergreens…”

Now knowing the album’s now evident theme, the song Dollar Days now feels like the most honest and emotional song on the album, if not most open and vulnerable song he’s ever written. 

There’s a finite beauty to Lazarus. It’s over. Written from the future, where there’s no turning back.

“I’ll be free…”

But on Dollar Days we're back on the final path, and there's a real sense of angst and frustration, of the knowledge that he had little time left, yet he still had work to do; perhaps wanting to pull off another Ziggy moment and surprise everybody, but not in the way he eventually would.

“I’m dying to push their backs against the grain and fool them all again and again…. I’m trying to.”

Through those lyrics alone, you can sense his undying creativity was driving him forwards, pushing him on to keep going, working and creating.

Blackstar’s closing track I Can’t Give Everything Away, also has a sad finality to it. It is as if he’s saying, “you can’t have everything, but here’s one last lot”. If Dollar Days is denial, then in some ways, I Can’t Give Everything Away is a resigned acceptance.

So in one sense, the whole album makes me think of the stages/cycle of grief – that so many fans around the world are now experiencing:

Denial > Anger > Bargaining > Depression > Acceptance

It does feel like the loss of a friend or close family member. Yet, I didn’t know the man and had never met him, beyond standing a few meters away during the two times I saw him perform live (see my previous blog entry about that!).

But to those of us who took David’s music to that extra, deeper level and gleamed so much from it, it is unsurprising that we feel such a very personal loss. Not only knowing that David won’t be around any more, but also that internal sense of loss, attached to our own memories and all our personal experiences of his music that shaped our lives.

But Blackstar is an incredible album as a work of music and creativity alone. While in many ways it embodies his musical legacy, to my ears, it follows a similar thinking to the kind of more experimental albums that he put out in the 1990s – The Buddha of Suburbia, 1.Outside and Earthling. All three of those albums sounded ahead of their time at the time, and still sound incredibly current today. They included similar jazz elements that would go on to form the backbone of the music on Blackstar, and sit comfortably alongside it. It’s a great shame that much of the music press and critics didn’t have the brain capacity to understand or appreciate those albums at the time.

Its is worth noting, that despite being a similarly adventurous album, Blackstar was already headed for the number one spot before Bowie left us. So it pleases me to know, or at least hope, that David was aware of this, seeing his final work already embraced so enthusiastically.

On Blackstar he sings "Somebody else took his place...", yet we know that his particular boots will never be filled. David Bowie was always ahead of the game, musically, artistically and visually, and he stunned the world in so many ways right to the end.

“Ain’t that just like me.”

Oooh-wee-ooo?!

Today, I'm going to talk about the Doctor Who theme, and one version in particular. This is the obvious point of convergence between my love of science fiction and electronic music, and there's no denying the influence of Who's long history of electronic scores – both the theme tune and incidental soundtracks – in my own music.

One of my earliest musical memories is hearing the original Delia Derbyshire version of the Doctor Who theme, which my parents had on a record along with other popular television theme tunes. 

I like all the versions of the Doctor Who theme tune. Each offers something different yet unique and relevant to the era it represented. But the version I'm going to talk about is the seriously underrated 1986 arrangement by composer Dominic Glynn. Out of all the different versions, this is the one that has perhaps influenced me the most, musically.

So, let's cast our minds back to 1986. I was an eight-year-old, with a serious Doctor Who obsession (not much has changed, I admit). So when the series was given an 18-month 'rest' in 1985, I had to endure a long and torturous wait for the return of the Doctor. It seemed like an eternity had passed when the Doctor (then played by Colin Baker) finally returned to our screens in late 1986. Except somehow, the news that the series was even coming back had passed me by! And I still remember the day and the moment, having no idea whatsoever that it was returning.

It was a Saturday tea time in early September, and I had just finished watching and recording Roland Rat: The Series (yes, really...). I was just about to eject my video tape when I suddenly realised that the familiar Doctor Who titles were glowing out of the screen towards me. I hadn't realised what was happening, because there was also something unfamiliar about it – the music. 

Then it clicked. I almost combusted with excitement at the realisation that a new series was starting right then, as I quickly thrust the Play and Record buttons back in on the VHS machine, and sat back in amazement. But new Doctor Who AND new music?! This was a lot to comprehend in my post-Roland Rat haze!

The Trial of A Timelord season took the show in a very dark and unexpected direction. What was going on? How could my Doctor possibly be on trial? His own people turned against him? Almost everything about the new show felt different; new production values, new special effects, new ideas and most notably, new music, with composer Dominic Glynn handling the incidental music as well as the new theme tune.

This was perhaps the first time that the atmosphere and textures of the incidental music felt like a continuation of the actual title music. There was an icy edge to the music, an uneasiness and foreboding atmosphere, which accompanied the darker stories perfectly. Of course, as we all now know, Doctor Who was having troubles of its own behind the scenes at the time, but back then I was oblivious to all of that.

Glynn's arrangement perfectly matched not only this more menacing direction, but also the colourful, spacey aesthetic of the Sixth Doctor's title sequence itself. I also thought this new version of the theme music was an ideal match to Colin Baker's Doctor's often unpredictable persona – and it was great to see his Doctor finally get his own theme tune, rather than continuing with the hand-me-down version.

But after that first episode had aired, I distinctly remember talking to friends about the music more than the episode itself! It had evidently struck a chord with me.

Although it obviously had to follow the general arrangement of the classic Who theme, Glynn introduced drones, shimmers and various other nuances and atmospheres which gave his rendition a distinctive identity. It was very different to any version that had gone before, yet it was still very much the Doctor Who theme. What he achieved was a version that had the dynamic of the Peter Howell arrangement from 1980, combined with the haunting, unearthly atmosphere of the 1963 original. There's just something about Glynn's 1986 version, which still to this day, gives me goosebumps. 

The "scream" or "sting" (the bit at the very beginning) is also the most dramatic and piercing that the show has had to date, tearing perfectly into the cliffhanger at the end of each episode. I was already obsessed with the various arrangements of the show's theme tune before then, so when faced with a new version to digest, one of the first things I did was stuck my cassette recorder in front of the TV and taped the new the music (intro and outro, of course!). Then to my utmost excitement, BBC Records released an LP containing the full-length version! 

The LP came with an eighties-tastic holographic sleeve. And I vividly remember having a nasty head cold on the day it arrived, but that didn't stop me from hauling myself out of bed to get the thing on the record player. I remember sitting there with blocked ears, a blocked nose and a fuzzy, dizzy head, listening to the full-length arrangement of the new theme, not only in glorious stereo, but with all the exciting additional bits you didn't get to hear on TV!

This version of the theme music has also aged well, unlike Keff McCulloch's 1987 arrangement which followed. But in 2008 when the BBC finally released the whole Trial season on DVD, I was really impressed to find a brand new remix of the 1986 theme tune, sounding superb and bringing it bang up to date. I hadn't heard it in years, and I was instantly transported back to that exciting Saturday afternoon.

So while it may not be immediately obvious, the music of Doctor Who in all its forms has been a big influence on my own instrumental music. Maybe that's why there's nearly always a science fiction edge to it, somewhere along the way. 

But needless to say, that whenever I use the pitch-shift slider on my midi-synth to bend a note, Mr Glynn's Doctor Who theme is lurking there, in my mind!

My new album Timeshift is available from:

https://thelightdreams.bandcamp.com/album/timeshift

Dominic Glynn's new Gallifrey Remixes and Ravalox Remixes are available on Amazon.

...and Who, Where and When, my personal account of growing up with Doctor Who in the 1980s and beyond, is available for free download here.

Panoramic music

This week saw the release of Panorama, my fourth album of instrumental music in support of the Initiative for Interstellar Studies (I4IS). 

While open to interpretation to a degree, my basic idea when composing Panorama, was 'music for a new world'. I was starting to imagine what kind of alien vistas that may stretch out before us, as we take our first steps on a newly discovered hospitable planet. The concept of my previous album for the Initiative, Beyond the Boundary, was space flight and a journey, so to follow that up with the discovery and exploration of a new world – the destination – seemed like a logical step. 

Work on this album actually began in April 2013, not long after I'd released Traces. However, despite working up several demos, I hit a block early on, and it would take a long time - many months - before an album of any form was starting to take shape. 

The first piece of music I made was actually the opening track, Touchdown. This seemed perfect right from the start, as a transitionary track between the interstellar flight of Beyond the Boundary, and the uncharted territory of Panorama. The final mix of the track is almost all the original demo - it is slightly raw and untamed in places, but for me it just worked like that, and over working the track would have risked losing that initial feeling.

Hear Touchdown on Soundcloud.

The title Panorama came quite early on, too. This was music for landscapes and huge vistas. Widescreen images in the mind's eye. And once that title was in place, the music and ideas began to flow, clearing the creative block I'd experienced at the start of the project.

Hear Panorama on Soundcloud.

One of my early plans was to make an album with no drums or percussion at all. This is something I've dabbled with in the past, and really wanted try. But it didn't turn out that way, so maybe the drum-free album will be a future project! However, Panorama does have several sparse, minimal pieces true to my drum-free idea, one of which is Aurora - perhaps one of the most evocative and atmospheric tracks on the album. At some point I was even considering this one for the title track. Aurora was another track from the early stages of the project, which just came out perfectly in one take. 

The main challenge throughout the process was how to make music for a world that I cannot see or visit, but can only imagine?

I spent time looking at the Mars Rover's photographs of the planet surface, my favourite space and SF art, and of course, films, gleaming inspiration from things like the water world and ice planets in Interstellar and even the dream-like sequence at the end of Contact. The list goes on!

But the music also needed a sense of mystery to accompany the notion of exploration and discovery, and those ideas started to flow once I created the middle section of what became Crystal Cavern. Until then, it was just a demo track of the first couple of minutes, lacking direction. And it turned into one of my favourite tracks on the album, also reminding me of the kind of approach I took with my first album, Into the Light, in 2007. 

I'll be the first to admit that Panorama was a difficult album to get right. I even took a break from it for a few months while I made Future Worlds Redux and Sentient City! But giving it some time and distance, was just what it needed, as when I returned to it, all the pieces suddenly fitted together. Once I had made the title track, the rest of the ideas all emerged.

The final album comprises 15 tracks, plus a short bonus track when you purchase the full download. Rise was a piece of music I composed for the I4IS after their involvement in the Shackleton 2 helium balloon project, which saw a probe boasting the I4IS logo travel to 90,000 feet into the Earth's stratosphere, then take a selfie! So while not directly related to the theme of the album, it felt appropriate that Rise should feature in an album supporting the Initiative.

Panorama is available now via Bandcamp.