Turns out one of the architects I work with is a huge fan of David's. I only have 3-4 of his cd's, but this guy brought in a stack and put on my desk. O Obner Wisepeople, where does one begin?

David Sylvian & Robert Fripp - The First Day, Damage
David Sylvian - Gone to Earth, Everything and Nothing
Sunday All Over the World - Kneeling at the Shrine-- oops, not Sylvian but more of a Fripp side project...
David Sylvian/Ryuichi Sakamoto - World Citizen

Tweaker - 2 a.m. wakeup call/The Attraction to All Things Uncertain
(not really Sylvian, but he co-wrote the song Linoleum)

edit: I've started with the First Day... so far, so good.

Definitely supplement this with the Rain Tree Crow album and the original Hansa Japan albums.

Cool, Billz.... all's I got in my collection is:

Dead Bees on a Cake
Blemish
The Good Son vs. The Only Daughter
Nine Horses

Gone to Earth is still one of my favourite albums by him. After First Day, definitely put this on.

World Citizen is just a single, I believe. Damage is the concert that Fripp and Sylvian did after First Day. Everything and Nothing is a career retrospective, just to give you some idea how you may want to fit those in.

I like your co-workers taste in music a lot. I love Tweaker, Fripp, Sylvian, etc.

Wow, Blemish? Good Son vs. Only Daughter? You have a really slanted view of what he's capable of. And although he's front and center on the Nine Horses disk, as I mentioned in a different thread, it's like a career from a parallel universe -- there's something intangibly not "him" on that disk, for better or worse (left as an exercise for the reader). Definitely put Everything and Nothing in a place of "importance", as to listening (I don't know if that means first or last or middle to you, but..."important").

And you're still missing one of his poppiest efforts, Brilliant Trees, but a lot of that is on Everything and Nothing (I think). EDIT: No, I stand corrected, there is little to nothing that I recognize as being from Brilliant Trees on Everything and Nothing, based on the tracklisting. If you like the first disk of Gone to Earth (or is that the one-disk version?), definitely go back and get Brilliant Trees.

Oh lordy...

I would start with "Quiet Life", their third. It's a transitional album for them, marking the break from guitar-driven/synth supported glam-punk (very similar to the first two Tubeway Army records, and in a similar vein to John Foxx's Ultravox) to the dreamy keyboard and bass driven "Gentlemen Take Polaroids".

I think this will appeal to you, based on your affinity for Duran Duran. It's got a cover of the Velvet's "All Tomorrow's Parties" that is astounding.

If you find you like the music in addition to Sylvian's vox, check out some of Mick Karn's side and solo projects. His first solo album, "Titles" is excellent. He also hooked up with Peter Murphy under the guise of Dali's Car.

Rain Tree Crow was a Japan reunion, circa '91.

Yes, I am familiar with Japan, so in that respect, I'm familiar with other styles he's dabbled in. Sorry I didn't clarify that in the earlier post. "Quiet Life" is excellent. I knew about the Dali's Car incarnation, but never really investigated it... I'm a huge Peter Murphy fan, but don't want to be disappointed... well, I guess I did buy "Holy Smoke" though, didn't I? Still, Peter could read from the yellow pages, and I'd pay to see it.

I have a really sweet vinyl copy of that album. Recently broke it out after not listening to it for many many moons. Not good. Didnt age well.

Always been curious about Sylvian and Japan though.

Dana, if you are looking for reference, I'd say its far and away the worst post Bauhaus thing that any of them have recorded (that I've heard and thats most everything)

I gotta get on converting some vinyl to MP3.

Well...yes and no -- it's all the same cast of characters, but the music is nothing alike at all.

Yeah, he's interesting... quite a character actually. Don't know if I could spend massive amounts of time with him chatting music, as he tends to get a bit excited (and he's one of those "close talkers" that I get freaked out by... you know the kind... invades a little too closely into your private space to talk to you). He LURVES his King Crimson, that's fo sho... always trying to pimp them to me.

Ha! You just described me (except for the space-invader part). I have been described as "bubbly", when it comes to talking about music.

And Crimson! Eh-xcellent.

Ask him if he has a sister for me. (J/K...)

Fair enough, but I still hear a healthy enough tie to "Gentlemen..." especially between songs like "Pocketful of Change", "Black Crow..." and "My New Career", "Methods of Dance".

well, he's 50, so I doubt he's got a hot sister your age!

Maybe a better way to phrase it is that it is the logical progression of where they might have gone, had they been playing together the whole time. So, covers both of us -- logical progression == same band; playing together the whole time == still a big (8 year) gap.I'm 42, and I don't mind older women. Although you're right -- I'd still like her to be hot, although my definition of hot isn't the same as most everyone else's on this board.

Of course, with my luck, he would have a hot (by my definition) sister who was into cool music and quite possibly interested in a rendezvous...except that she lived clear across the country from me.

Besides, like I said, I was just kidding...

My favorite Sylvian (one of my favorties albums, period) is Secrets Of The Beehive which hasn't been mentioned yet.

Then of course my favorite album of last year Nine Horses

Oops. Now that one is represented on Everything and Nothing, right?Top five for me. And by that, I mean one of a five-way tie for #1. (Well...3- or 4-way tie, at least.)

I'm with the Spoon.

Which version of GtE is this? The only one that should be listened to is the recent expanded, retracked remaster that puts the album back in the order that was intended, spread over two discs (in a freakin' GORGEOUS digipak, I might add.) Disc two is all the instrumental stuff, and it's really beautiful sequenced like this. If you only have the one disc (and if this guy is as big a fan as he seems, I'm doubting that he doesn't have the two-disc one) then listen to it, but know that it's so much better in the expanded form.


There are also two versions of this. The original was mixed by Fripp and is much harsher and edgier, and came in a very cool box slip-case with a big booklet of artwork from an installation the two of them did. Sylvian went back a couple years ago and remixed it more to his liking, and it's more typically Sylvian-sounding. This comes in a regular jewelcase and has scribbly artwork that doesn't do the music justice like the original did. The mixes are so different I actually can think of them as two different albums (each also has a song that the other does not.)


E&N is a very different kind of retrospective, however - many of the songs have been remixed and some even have extra parts added in. However, I really like this tactic - it makes the whole thing have a real personality and even a sort-of narrative flow. It's tremendously beautiful. Don't think for a minute that if you own all his albums that you don't need this - you do! (And track down the 3-disc version - the third disc is the only place the studio version of "The Blinding Light of Heaven" exists. A live version of this is on Damage and that had been the only place you could get this until E&N.)


Yeah, me too! Why the hell can't I work with someone like this? The people I work with, if they care about music at all, listen to crap like Blink-182 (this is a 32 year old guy I'm talking about here, not a just-out-of-college kid!)


Blemish is undoubtedly a really different project for him, but I think you can get a good feel for what the guy's about. I haven't heard Good Son vs. Only Daughter - is it worth getting?

I really wish he and Fripp would get together again, if only to put together a DVD of the Japanese Laserdisc of the First Day tour. I have a crappy old VHS bootleg of that and it's AMAZING. That's half of the then-upcoming King Crimson right there - Pat Mastellotto drumming, Trey Gunn on 12-string Stick (getting to see him in action is fascinating - he is responsible for a LOT more of the music than you realize,) and Fripp on guitar, plus glimpses of Michael Brook weaving his beautiful infinite guitar sounds in between it all. Even better than the Damage live set.

Same here - I was completely blown away by Nine Horses, and it spent a lot more time being listened to than I expected. Dare I say his best album since Secrets? I do!

If you dig Rain Tree Crow, check out Polytown - it's basically like RTC without Sylvian (well, okay, or Steve Jansen,) and with David Torn taking a bigger presence up front with his truly astonishing and entirely unique guitar work. Terry Bozzio's drumming is mesmerizing. The spirit is very similar to RTC, but it's like one step further out from RTC, which is one step further out from late period Japan, which is one step further out from early Japan.

If you like the ambient instrumentals, check the used bins for Sylvian & Holger Czukay's "Plight and Premonition" and "Flux and Mutability"--two lengthy soundscapes per disc.

I've been waiting since 1987 for another album in the "Secrets of the Beehive" vein. He's been hit or miss ever since, as far as I'm concerned.

Really? I only have the first one. Never got the second one, because I thought I already had it. Will get the Sylvian version...eventually...Yup, got it when it first came out.Now that's one thing I don't have yet -- it's a remix of tracks from Blemish, though, by even more experimental artists...I have that (the laserdisc). When I finally get around to digitizing my laserdiscs, I'll keep you in mind.

Re: ambient stuff -- there's also Alchemy: An Index of Possibilities and Camphor. Like every other album he does is ambient.

Anyone have Weatherbox? I found three of the discs from it in a used CD store once...and yes, of course I got 'em...

And yeah, I have Polytown too -- big Torn fan, even was on an emailing list with him (loopers' delight).

(insert mandatory part about how he's so hot...)

I'm thinking it's time I got some of those ones Dusty's talking about. Build a bigger Sylvian library.

I literally had to look up who this dude is, I'd never even heard of him before.

He's kind of made himself unmarketable at times. Coolest voice on the planet and yet prefers instrumentals.