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| Track list: 1. Immunity 2. Form By Firelight 3. Breathe This Air 4. Open Eye Signal Running time: 24 minutes Released: 2014 |
Jon Hopkins is something of a favourite of mine, and I loved Immunity when I picked it up. So when it was re-released with some new versions of the tracks on a second disc, well I bought it again. To be honest, I had not realised when I hit "buy" that Asleep Versions was not a standalone e.p. but rather a second disc repackaged with Immunity but never mind. Free gift!
The first track here is the closer on the parent album, a wonderful work harking back to other collaborations between Hopkins and King Creosote - my most listened to artist on LastFM, a lot of him to come (starting in B). It is a very different version of the song. Asleep is about right, at least for the first 2 minutes until the vocal comes in, much clearer than on the album version... clear enough for me to finally confirm that the words are (some of) those from Carbon Dating Agent (from KC's album Vintage Quays). That has bugged me for 18 months(!). There is not much else to this one - just a dreamy sound; it is not as good a version in my book, but it plays very differently.
I cannot remember the other tunes from Immunity with such clarity so as to make comparisons, but I am immediately struck by the fact Form By Firelight has a vocal here and does not feel familiar at all. There is maybe a theme running through it that lightly tinkles a bell somewhere but this aural landscape is richly built for volume - that should be space - I can easily imagine drifting off to these tunes and having some trippy dreams as a result. These two tracks were from the quieter end of Immunity, rather than the more club-inspired opening. I cannot remember where I saw it but I found a description of the album as charting a night out, starting big and busy then dying back to chill. The second pair of tracks are reworkings of busier, livelier tracks and are massively changed as a result. There is still the pulse of a beat there, but rather than slaving the other sounds to it, they harness that in reverse, suborning the rhythm to a quiet role of servitude. It is amazing that these would even be called versions of the same tracks. Chalk and cheese.
Open Eye Signal is 11 minutes in length here (8 originally) and slow to get any sort of life, drifting through a haze. I have Hopkins albums going back more than a decade and this is as empty as anything he has done in terms of how much void there is left to rattle around in your ears. I am astounded by the relationship between this and a really up-tempo track that was to Immunity what Wire was to Insides. In some ways what it reminds me of most is the sheer poignancy that Hopkins' production gave to And The Racket They Made, the closing track from Bombshell - the first KC album I shall reach. The song helped in that case, here there are no words, is no structure like that to craft around. Built in a vacuum. It is pretty moving whilst at the same time managing to disappoint a little because I cannot hear even echoes of the track with which it shares a name. It may have been a little too subtle there.
Overall I am not sorry I picked this up at all. I think these versions have less immediate appeal and, by their nature, less accessibility in a random playlist, but they sculpt sound nicely and are certainly different enough to maintain them alongside Immunity.
The first track here is the closer on the parent album, a wonderful work harking back to other collaborations between Hopkins and King Creosote - my most listened to artist on LastFM, a lot of him to come (starting in B). It is a very different version of the song. Asleep is about right, at least for the first 2 minutes until the vocal comes in, much clearer than on the album version... clear enough for me to finally confirm that the words are (some of) those from Carbon Dating Agent (from KC's album Vintage Quays). That has bugged me for 18 months(!). There is not much else to this one - just a dreamy sound; it is not as good a version in my book, but it plays very differently.
I cannot remember the other tunes from Immunity with such clarity so as to make comparisons, but I am immediately struck by the fact Form By Firelight has a vocal here and does not feel familiar at all. There is maybe a theme running through it that lightly tinkles a bell somewhere but this aural landscape is richly built for volume - that should be space - I can easily imagine drifting off to these tunes and having some trippy dreams as a result. These two tracks were from the quieter end of Immunity, rather than the more club-inspired opening. I cannot remember where I saw it but I found a description of the album as charting a night out, starting big and busy then dying back to chill. The second pair of tracks are reworkings of busier, livelier tracks and are massively changed as a result. There is still the pulse of a beat there, but rather than slaving the other sounds to it, they harness that in reverse, suborning the rhythm to a quiet role of servitude. It is amazing that these would even be called versions of the same tracks. Chalk and cheese.
Open Eye Signal is 11 minutes in length here (8 originally) and slow to get any sort of life, drifting through a haze. I have Hopkins albums going back more than a decade and this is as empty as anything he has done in terms of how much void there is left to rattle around in your ears. I am astounded by the relationship between this and a really up-tempo track that was to Immunity what Wire was to Insides. In some ways what it reminds me of most is the sheer poignancy that Hopkins' production gave to And The Racket They Made, the closing track from Bombshell - the first KC album I shall reach. The song helped in that case, here there are no words, is no structure like that to craft around. Built in a vacuum. It is pretty moving whilst at the same time managing to disappoint a little because I cannot hear even echoes of the track with which it shares a name. It may have been a little too subtle there.
Overall I am not sorry I picked this up at all. I think these versions have less immediate appeal and, by their nature, less accessibility in a random playlist, but they sculpt sound nicely and are certainly different enough to maintain them alongside Immunity.
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