John Foxx & Harold Budd, Translucence + Drift Music (Edsel)

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I must admit at the outset that I have not followed the career of John Foxx since he left Ultravox, the slick 1980s electronic outfit with brains. I had no idea what kind of musical life he´d been living outside being frontman and singer for that band. Harold Budd, on the other hand, is an artist whose work I have followed with constant interest ever since discovering his Pavillion of Dreams on Brian Eno´s famed Obscure label.

There are many connections between Foxx and Budd, beyond the fact that both are from the British Isles. Eno is the most obvious of them, having produced and subsequently collaborated on two landmark ambient albums with Budd, as well as having produced one of Ultravox´s releases. But that was a long, long time ago, and what or who brings them together now I do not know. They may very well have been acquaintances for a long time.

Here we have a double album housed in an opulent gatefold digipak adorned with fractured, colourful images generated by Foxx. In it, one learns that John Foxx has most certainly not been idle, as the discography inside reveals, featuring numerous solo albums, many of them issued as double CDs, like this one. All tracks on Translucence + Drift Music are credited to Foxx & Budd, although each disc has its own personality. Again, I cannot use Foxx as a reference point as I have not heard his own material, but the Translucence disc is highly reminiscent of your average - and by that I mean dazzling - Budd solo CD, with a sparsely played piano striking shimmering notes that hang in the air and disappear into a great solitude. The second disc, Drift Music, does indeed live up to its title, and is more floating electronics turning and shifting in hue gradually, all very much in the spirit of Brian Eno´s classic mid-1980s ambience. Has the first disc been navigated by Budd, the second by Foxx?

A track title from the first CD, "Almost Overlooked", would be an appropriate subtitle for this album. Released on a small label with little high-profile promotional backing, its release passed quickly and barely noticed. However, it is a goldmine for fans of Enoesque ambience, a brand-new relic from that era of obscure landscape-creating ambience seemingly frozen in amber.