History
The Orb have always primarily been composed of one individual, Alex Paterson, along with numerous and varied individuals assisting throughout the group's recording career. Paterson's late 80's and early 90's chillout dj sets in Paul Oakenfold's "Land of Oz" night in the club Heaven are thought of by those involved as legendary. and included collaborations with another ambient house pioneer Jimmy Cauty. Paterson said of these events:
| “ | "We'd build melodies up by overdubbing and mixing multiple tracks and then take an eight track (or was it a twelve track?) into Heaven, just linking it up to three decks, loads of CD players, loads of cassettes... we used to keep it very, very quiet. We never used to play any drums in there. It'd be, just like, you know, BBC sound effects, really... four or five hours playing really early dub reggae... For All Mankind . We had white screens so we could put up visuals as well. We had home movies of ducks in the park. We'd go for everything. It was all layering on top of each other. " | ” |
Following success in the singles market (including the 1988 "Tripping on Sunshine", 1989 "Kiss EP" and 1989 "Huge, evergrowing brain that rules from the center of the Universe"), Paterson and Cauty started work on their first album but split in 1990 due to disagreements about releasing The Orb's material on Cauty's record label KLF Communications. While Cauty released his portions of the planned album as Space and resumed his partnership with Bill Drummond as The KLF, Paterson moved on to his next collaboration "Little Fluffy Clouds" in Autumn 1990 with Killing Joke's Youth. The track was recorded by an 18 year old studio Engineer and future Orb collaborator Kris "Thrash" Weston.
In April 1991, the Orb released The Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld for an audience familiar with their groundbreaking singles and several John Peel radio sessions. The album was received in the UK and Europe with critical acclaim. The album rose to position #29 in the UK Album charts. By mid-91, the Orb had signed a deal to release the album in the U.S. but were forced to edit the double-disc 109:41 minute UK release down to a one disc 70:41 minutes. The full double-disc version and cassette were later released in the U.S. by Island.
Read more about this topic: Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld
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