Joe Meek, The Blue Men, VA — I Hear A New World/ The Pioneers Of Electronic Mus

From Cherry Red sublabel El Here’s a three-CD box set that brings together 60’s pop producer Joe Meek infamous electronic space adventure concept album I Hear A New World, and a good cross selection of pioneering electronic music from the 1950s & 1960s. The three CD’s each come in their own card slip sleeves- these are presented inside a hard card flip sided box. We also get a twenty-four-page booklet- this features a write-up about Joe Meek & I Hear A New World, and small write-ups about the other eighteen early electronic artists  featured on the release.
 
The first disc opens up with the Meek material- this is features twenty-four tracks in all- which takes in the 1991 restored version of I Hear A New World, and an unreleased 1960 album that features a mixture of different versions of album tracks & new tracks that relating to the themes on I Hear A New World. So a little bit about Mr Meek- he was a English music producer, who was active between the years 1954 & 1967 when he sadly killed himself & his Lady after falling out of favor- he was known for producing & engineering experiment & space-age pop singles, as well as helping develop studio techniques such as overdubbing, sampling & reverb.
I Hear A New World was recorded in 1959 & released in 1960- and featured as well as Meeks Studio mastery & sound trickery is The Blue Men- a five-piece London skittle band. The twelve-track/thirty-five-minute album is basically a very quirky experimental easy listening trip into out-of-space. We open up with the title track which is a blend of crawling surf rock, chipmunk & sickly reverbing harmonizing vocals. As we move into the album we go from space-fed & clip-clopping skittle meets wind-down toy time like guitars, onto twitching 'n' shifting early electro effect scaping over speed-up & high pitched chantings. Through tolling & drifting blends of space ambeince bounding piano-led rock & roll, and all manner of daring & creative blends of Meeks space-bound sound-making & The Blue Men's wrapped & melted skittle, surf rock, rock & roll. In many ways, the use of sound is years ahead of its time, yet it also feels very much of the late 50’s early 60’s which is an interesting place to be. I’d say you'll need to enjoy your experimental music with a feel of playfulness & campness- so if you're into someone like say The Residents, I think you’ll like what we have here.
Next on disc one, we get the unreleased Meek album from 1960- and this is best described as more out-there/ less structured & concept arranged version of the first albums material, as many of the same songs & themes appear from I Hear Anew World- In all this album takes in eleven tracks.
This first disc fittingly, as the original I Hear A New World was recorded in London, features eight tracks from the BBC Radiophonic workshop- here we find great lo-fi and moody early electronic creativity from brit electro pioneers likes of Delia Derbyshire & Daphne Oram- the disc is topped off with two tracks from experimental easy listening project Ray Cathode- that was created by renowned producer Sir Geroge Martin for the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop, and really are great examples of early electronica & easy grooves.
 
Each of the other two discs comes in at around the eighty-minute mark and are full of classic examples of pioneering electronic music & experimentation. We go from early electronic pop of Dutch sound maker Tom Dissvelt, through to 1950’s Musique Concrete from Pierrie Boluez, onto the dissonant electronics meets orchestrated compositions of Edgard Varese. Through to late 1950 shifting & jarring electronic soundscaping of Luc Ferrari, before finishing off the final disc with returning to the UK with work from British female electro pioneer Daphne Oram. On each disc, there’s a good selection of different artists, and all in all these two discs give a nice of sight/ primmer of early electronic composition between the 1950s & 1960s.
 
Though the material over this three boxset is certainly connected- I feel it’s better to look at it as two separate releases- with the quirky & playful space-bound meeting of melted rock ‘n’ roll and tripped out studio trickery that is I Hear A New World, and the two and a quarter disc compilation of early electronic tracks. So, as a result, it may lead buyers picking up this set for either one or the other release- but it’s certainly well enough priced set with at the moment a price tag of around £12.00 for the box.