Released not long after A-Ha’s twentieth anniversary, Singles 1984-2004 rounds up 19 of the group’s A-sides, beginning with 1985’s international number one hit single “Take on Me” and concluding with 2002’s “Lifelines.” In the U.S., A-Ha are often seen as the quintessential MTV-driven new wave one-hit wonder - the pen-and-ink animation of “Take on Me” defining an era - but the group had a long, fruitful career as hitmakers in Europe, and this collection presents an excellent overview of that career, containing such continental smashes as “The Sun Always Shines on TV,” “Hunting High and Low,” “I’ve Been Losing You,” “Cry Wolf,” “The Living Daylights,” “Stay on These Roads,” “Crying in the Rain,” “Summer Moved On,” and “Forever Not Yours.” It may not be enough to win over skeptics but it’s more than enough to prove that A-Ha were not one-hit wonders, and it will surely satisfy anybody who is wanting a solid collection of their biggest hit singles.
Coming from the home of Future Sound of London and credited to their ‘producer’ Yage, "Ignition of the Sun" is a deep and evolving journey through liquid spewing analogue sequences, warm saturated swampy sine waves. It calls back to a time from the early 70s with bands such as Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze.
All sounds were created and sequenced entirely on the EMS Synthi AKS, multitracked and mixed to 15ips 1/4 Revox tape. The EMS Synthi AKS was first introduced in 1971, one of the earliest Synthesisers available and as used by Radiophonic Workshop, Pink Floyd, Brian Eno.
The mystical figure On Ka'a Davis returns for his second CD on Tzadik, and his first in twenty-five years - Blending the psychedelia of Sun Ra with Miles Davis and Jimi Hendrix, this is an epic, direct from the ever-growing counterculture of Downtown New York - Performing on guitar, synth keyboard, programmed sounds, and percussion On is joined here by Don McKenzie on drums and Ali Ali on trumpet. Years in the making the music is wild, varied, and intensely felt. A New York Underground classic!