8. Roger Eno and Plumbline - Siren 890

It feels strange to introduce Roger Eno. There is a form of electronic music that has never really required a genre name. Some call it Ambient, some call it Atmospheric. In a record shop, you'd probably find it in Electronic. Roger Eno has, for almost 20 years, been a defining figure when it comes to this music. It's something to appreciate, but not really talk about. I, personally, do not listen to Roger Eno. I don't really like most of his work. I am, however, a Plumbline listener. Plumbline, a.k.a. Will Thomas, is more of an "artist" than a "musician." This is said in the sense that music is used as a medium--a means, not an end. His 2005 release, Pin Points, is an attempt to capture sounds of New York City intersections. Thomas will spend hours with a microphone, recording sounds from the intersections. Then, through digital manipulate, he produces a song from those sounds. His first album, Circles, is a musical documentation of the landscape observed during a trip from LA to New York. Siren 890 is from Transparencies, a collab album with Roger Eno, that uses recordings from churches and buildings in East Anglia, England. The immersion that this song offers is priceless. While anything is good while staring out a window with headphones on, this is pretty fuckin' up there. Favorite sound: the rhythm that peaks its wave first at 0:40. I think of the rest of the song as a rolling blanket that on each iteration of this particular sound, is blown, ripped away.