Gyroscope/Caroline Records Andy Partridge & Harold Budd Bio.
XTC's Andy Partridge and ambient composer Harold Budd - an unlikely combination or happy co-incidence ? However surprising such a partnership might seem, here are two of modern music's more original exponents, who against (even their own) expectations have combined their highly individual abilities and disparate musical backgrounds to create almost an hour of very original music.
Harold and Andy were introduced by All Saints Records in the UK and Ray Hearn, a concert promoter in Tokyo. "I was in Japan opening a Virgin Megastore" says Andy. "Ray, who used to tour XTC in Japan, asked me over a very boozy dinner if I'd like to work with Harold. I said oooh yes please, then didn't hear anything for ages".
All Saints Records finally got word to Harold Budd about the possibility of a collaboration. Harold notes he "trailed out to Swindon to meet Andy. We spent the afternoon in his garden shed where his studio is situated, just getting acquainted and messing around with musical ideas. I'm always astounded by people who have very good ears, because mine are very mediocre and Andy's are superbly tuned".
"We didn't have a clue what we were going to come up with before we met" continues Andy "but we found a common ground between the kind of things that each of us likes and we created Frankenstein's Bathing Beauty".
After Harold returned to the States, he and Andy set up a furious two-way fax exchange, whereby each bombarded the other with ideas for titles, structure, visuals and more. Harold describes the exercise as "two architects designing a bridge between them and deciding how it was going to look before they built it. We hadn't the faintest idea what the musical part would look like, but that was the fun bit, because that's when we started decorating the bridge and deciding what the gargoyles would look like".
Once in the studio the two realised they worked in completely different ways. Harold tends to work improvisationally whereas Andy likes to know exactly what he's doing before he starts. The result was an enriching experience where both were able to learn from each other's recording technique.
"I tend to settle for approximations rather quickly" explains Harold, "because I want to get on to the next stage. Andy doesn't".
"I learned what not to play" adds Andy. "Criticisms have been justly levelled at me that I tend to over-ornament and baroque things up; this has been a great experience for me learning to leave stuff out and get as much out of the spaces or the "implied" as possible, rather than gargoyling everything to death".
Once they began there was no stopping them. Ideas sprang to life and titles grew from Harold's lifelong passion for archaeology and world history and from Andy's early training and continued interest in fine and illustrative art.
Through The Hill features Harold on acoustic piano, Hammond organ and voice-over, while Andy performs on acoustic and electric guitar, zither, shakers and cymbals ( $1.49 from his local charity store) and some bells that Harold tucked away in his trans-Atlantic luggage.
An early Korg guitar synthesizer also makes an appearance (loaned from XTC's Dave Gregory) . Andy comments "If you play one note it may eventually follow that note with a synthesized note that's kind of in relation to it. If you play two notes it can't decide what you're playing so it improvises somewhere between them and rests on one of them. So you end up with strange kinds of trumpet squiggles or tube meanderings till it finds the note it likes - it might not even be the one you played".
The duo also used a sample module, a Proteus, which allowed them to tune each note on the keyboard to a different pitch producing "archaic" or "argumentative" sounding chords.
All of which has resulted in an album of tightly focussed, yet extremely fluid musical passages called "Through The Hill".
All original work is acknowledged as being the copyright of the originator.