Recording
"The Girl with the Sun in Her Head" was dedicated to the memory of Volume magazine photographer Sally Harding, a friend of the Hartnolls, who died in December 1995. The track was entirely recorded using electricity provided by Greenpeace's mobile solar power generator, Cyrus. It opens with the sound of a heartbeat which serves as bass and develops into what many critics hold as one of Orbital's most accomplished pieces.
"P.E.T.R.O.L." was included in the video game Wipeout (and on its later soundtrack album), and also on the soundtrack to the film π. The title of the fifth track, "Dŵr Budr" is Welsh for "dirty water" and was inspired by the Sea Empress oil spill environmental disaster which took place just off the coast of Wales in February 1996. "Adnan's" was originally included on 1995's charity album The Help Album, benefitting War Child.
Vocals on the album are credited to "Auntie", a pseudonym used by long-time collaborator Alison Goldfrapp on this release. Her singing on "Dŵr Budr" is nonsensical chanting, and has been rumoured to have been played backwards, though neither the brothers nor Goldfrapp herself will divulge any information.
The album's cover art is by John Greenwood, who is also responsible for creating the covers of previous Orbital releases. The collage for the internal artwork was created by Foul End Trauma, an anagrammatical alias for the design artists Fultano Mauder. The design group also contribute lyrics to the vocal version of "The Box" on the single's release, with one half of the group, Grant Fulton, providing vocals.
Read more about this topic: In Sides
Famous quotes containing the word recording:
“I didn’t have to think up so much as a comma or a semicolon; it was all given, straight from the celestial recording room. Weary, I would beg for a break, an intermission, time enough, let’s say, to go to the toilet or take a breath of fresh air on the balcony. Nothing doing!”
—Henry Miller (1891–1980)
“Write while the heat is in you.... The writer who postpones the recording of his thoughts uses an iron which has cooled to burn a hole with. He cannot inflame the minds of his audience.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“He shall not die, by G—, cried my uncle Toby.
MThe ACCUSING SPIRIT which flew up to heaven’s chancery with the oath, blush’d as he gave it in;—and the RECORDING ANGEL as he wrote it down, dropp’d a tear upon the word, and blotted it out for ever.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)