Instrumental Music

UnclePsychosis

Pretty much anything by Mogwai.

As a starting point I'd recommend "happy songs for happy people".

DulcetJones

I used to listen to a lot of solo flamenco guitar, players like Sabicas, Juan Martin etc..., then there's Paco de Lucia with his sort of jazz/fusion flamenco with a few other instruments, all brilliant playing. 

Fretwired

bingefeller said:

If you like classical then I would suggest Brad Mehldau.  He has a classical influence in his piano playing, as well as jazz and rock.  

Great track ....

Fretwired

Nordic jazz floats my boat .. Nils Petter Molvaer and guitarist Eivind Aarset .. worth a listen all the way through ..

CHRISB50

Snarky Puppy

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDXnPfA_5pY

Antoine Dufour

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPtbobbiBWI

DJ Shadow

www.youtube.com/watch?v=InFbBlpDTfQ

 

 

 

Fuzzdog

Phil_aka_Pip said:

ICBM said:

Mike Oldfield

OK some of his later stuff does have vocals - which can be very much an acquired taste - but most doesn't. Most is not 'electronic' either, although to describe it as guitar-based isn't really accurate in a conventional sense, even though his main instrument is guitar… if that makes sense.

I like Ommadawn

The end of part one of Ommadawn is actually the bit of music that made my young teenage brain decide to take up this whole guitar thingy in the first place.  Mike may have gone a 'meh' in recent years (in my opinion, at least) but he is still one of my favourite guitarists.

Also, if you want to have a very strange hour and a half, listen to Amarok.  If you want to drive yourself even more mad, try transcribing it and playing along, although tap dancing while doing a Margeret Thatcher impression is optional. )

Samgb

bobblehat said:

I've been listening to Public Service Broadcasting lately.

Inform Educate Entertain and The Race for Space albums.

Excellent stuff. 

I really like them. Unique

Samgb

By 'electronic' do you mean dancey/techno/clubbing type stuff or ALL electronic music?

Because there is quite a lot of great electronic music out there that has nothing to do with that. Start with something like Neu or Brian Eno's early ambient albums that is quite fantastic. Neu are really organic. They dont do much, but in a really interesting way. Tangerine Dream's 70s stuff is great as well. The Popol Vuh soundtrack to Werner Herzog's Nosferatu. The Wicker Man is another soundtrack which isnt electronic or strictly instrumental but it is dreamlike and unsettling and quite out there. It also has Christopher Lee singing a song about a woman whose fanny is as big as a kettle or something. So theres that...    

For more guitary stuff try Avocet by Bert Jansch.

Also, i listened to a Jim Campilongo album called Loose on the way into work this morning. He is a fantastic player and not a vocal in sight. Lovely tele sounds 

Samgb

Apologies for over use of the word 'Fantastic'

In't everything BRILLIANT! 

ICBM

Fuzzdog said:

Mike may have gone a 'meh' in recent years (in my opinion, at least) but he is still one of my favourite guitarists.

I would say very variable rather than meh. To his great credit he hasn't stagnated and is still trying new stuff, even if it doesn't always quite work.

He's gone from pure guitar-based rocky stuff (Guitars) - which is one that doesn't quite work in my opinion, not least because he insists on using his very unique tone on everything, when he could maybe have done with more variation - to trance (Tr3s Lunas, some of The Millenium Bell and Tubular Beats… even though I think he has probably reworked Tubular Bells enough times now!) - which is brilliant and I really like - to classical (Music Of The Spheres) - which is OK but I don't really relate to even though I like both conventional and modern 'classical'.

The only one I didn't like is the most recent, Man On The Rocks, which I think is the first record of his I've actively disliked.

Fuzzdog

ICBM said:

The only one I didn't like is the most recent, Man On The Rocks, which I think is the first record of his I've actively disliked.

That was mostly the album on which I based the 'meh' - I've tried to like it.  Really, really have.  I just don't.  It was recorded mostly via Skype sessions, and sounds like it. )  But at least it wasn't called 'Tubular Rocks' or something.  Still quite like 'Nuclear' though, so it's not a total loss.

I will note that the 'meh' is on a comparative scale to how much I love most of his music - he has high standards to live up to in my mind, as a lot of his stuff is on my list of favourite music of all time.  He'll be remixing Amarok soon, so hopefully he'll have a revelation and go back to making slightly odd but amazing instrumental music again.

Dominic

Classical music is best discovered working backwards chronologically - avoiding modern atonal composition which is hard to get to grips with;

start with blues /jazz influenced music such as Gershwin Rhapsody in blue,American in Paris etc........then go back to

French moderne turn of century  Ravel ,Saint-Saens,Erik Sartie,Debussy .....all very beautiful elegant music  next,

The great Romantic era (late ) Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninof

The great Romantic era mid Chopin,Brahms ,Listz, etc

 The early Romantic Schubert,Mozart,

Baroque  Bach, Telemann etc

 Then you have done a full circle because the bare bones and non-polyphony disects scales,arpeggios etc of Baroque music becomes so apparent as a means of understanding structure,improvisation or ornamentation ,resolutions etc - you can suddenly understand how the whole of western music developed into the music we hear today particularly Jazz etc and is very relevant to really understanding sophisticated guitar improv