Track Listing

1. Sea Green
2. Humming Chorus
3. Surfin
4. You Know Too Much About Flying Saucers
5. Spiral
6. Who Owns the Octopus
7. Bubble Universe
8. Fragamosia
9. Firebrand
10. They Live in the Sky
11. Colours from Nowhere

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #93001 in Music
• Released on: 2006-02-21
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.com
The first of what producer/composer William Orbit has described as his "binary" recordings for 2006 (this component arriving in February, the altogether different Cellcloud in May), Hello Waveforms is a work of subtle charms, brainy noodlings, and no landmark tracks. It yields understated pleasures to listeners itching to hear smartly conceived chillout electronica that evokes serenity minus lethargy (witness the percolating atmospherics of "Sea Green" and the richly textured headphone sojourn of "Who Owns the Octopus"). Yet while the overall experience is inherently enjoyable, some of Orbit's synth voices sound weirdly dated, as though an analog Moog (or Casio keyboard) had been revived to create some of the textures that swirl through his otherwise sophisticated sound fields. At such moments fans might envision this much-respected self-described "knob-twiddling producer chap" wearing an throwback athletic jersey as he injects Atari music into a PlayStation world, then packaging it all quite appropriately with a semi-psychedelic go-go fairy on the disc's cover. Often lovely, occasionally tepid, with nine instrumentals and two vocal tracks that more often float and meander rather than pulse and evolve, the slow-tempo Hello Waveforms stands as an intriguing project that has the ability to both engage and perplex fans of this sagacious studio wizard. --Terry Wood

Customer Reviews

Finally! [with a couple of reservations]
FOUR & 1/2 STARS, but let me explain why:

For the purposes of this review, let's view Mr. Orbit's discography this way: his solo albums ["Orbit", Strange Cargo 1,2,&3 and "Pieces In A Modern Style"] along with Strange Cargo's "Hinterland", Torch Song's albums ["Wish Thing" "Ecstasy" & "Towards The Unknown Region"] and Bassomatic's ["Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Bass" & "Science And Melody"] together as one body of work.

It's been six years since 2000's "Pieces In A Modern Style" and while that was a good disc, it still wasn't up to the Strange Cargo, Torch Song & Bassomatic standards. And since they were electronic versions of classical compositions, they needn't be.

I jonesed until this album was released and I wasn't disappointed per se, but truthfully, with the exception of the single "Spirals" featuring Sugababes & Kenna - this album sounds more like the follow-up to Torch Song's 1995 Opus "Towards The Unknown Region" than a flat-out William Orbit project. Don't get me wrong, the ethereal arrangements, deep bass, exquisite processing along with his production restraint and prowess are all there - it just doesn't reach the heights of the last 3 Strange Cargo albums or Hinterland, and it doesn't come close to the work of Bassomatic at all.

Not that this is a bad thing - this is a GREAT album to chill by and provides very visual and colorful music when the listener closes their eyes - exactly what most ALL William Orbit projects promise. I guess I just wish he would ramp up again and play with my mind the way he did with the Strange Cargo series.

When I say this sounds like a follow-up to Torch Song's last album, that is literal since Laurie Mayer and Rico Conning composed 4 out of the 11 tunes and performed on 6. It is very low key, quiet, mysterious and broods just beneath the surface but never breaks through. Perhaps it wasn't meant to, I may be hanging my expectations on it.

If you love Mr. Orbit's work, [and I REALLY, REALLY do], you will like this album and it will be an integral part of his discography for the fan. I took off 1/2 a star because I am really ready for a more upbeat and mysterious production from him. If you've been to his website, he has twenty 60-second clips of unreleased songs, an unreleased song from Hello Waveforms "G-155", as well as another 28 or so unreleased tunes. These are wasted just sitting on his site, unreleased. Most of these are EXCELLENT but you cannot download these songs and it would make sense to release these as part of a 'unreleased and b-sides' disc. These songs approach more of what I was hoping Hello Waveforms was going to be.

But with all that said, this is a great disc - I just hope he doesn't take another 6 years to release another album and he finally gives his fans an album of the songs he's been teasing them with on his site. If you love Orbit, you'll love this disc but I'm waiting for more... Respectfully submitted William, and anytime you'd like to work with me on my music, in either production or mixing, the door is WIDE OPEN!

William is Orbitesque as ever
William Orbit - Hello waveforms (Sanctuary)
STARS: 9 of 10

Almost 11 years after his previous soloalbum, the superproducer and
-remixer William Orbit is back with a proper collection of his own
songs. ("Pieces in a modern style" from 2000 doesn't 'really' count,
because it's a slightly altered reissue of the 1995-album.)

In many ways, Orbit dominated most of the 90's; he produced three of
his own electronic albums and also Beth Orton's debut album
"Superpinkymandy", Madonna's "Ray of light" and Blur's "13". Also, he
did a bunch of legendary remixes for i.e. Wendy & Lisa, One Dove, Peter
Gabriel, Depeche Mode, The Human League, Seal, Prince, The Cure - and
he was the first "external" person to ever remix Kraftwerk. Why do I
mention all this? Just to show the influence Orbit has had on his own
contemporaries and other artists.

Having done several big productions in the early 2000's, he's back solo
with a new collection of largely instrumental electronic goodies,
packed with his signature sounds and -harmonies. As usual, the songs
are extremely melodic, quite calm and downtempo, and almost modularly
built; they consist of repetitive riffs, melody lines and chords that
are added and subtracted. This gives the music an effect of
daydreaming, which is a good thing that has long been a part of the
attraction with William Orbit's music.

And for those who like great popsongs, here you'll find the best
Sugababes song ("Spiral") in ages, a pure pearl of pop in the same
sonic landscape as All Saints' "Pure shores" (that Orbit produced).
We can't fail to mention that old collaborators are still with us, such
as Laurie Mayer and Rico Conning - with whom Orbit formed Torch Song -
plus Caroline Lavelle and a host of others, but it still sounds 100%
Orbit.

Hence, this album is recommended warmly by Orbit-fans, including yours
truly, and if you like this calm and ambient record, you can look
forward to an uptempo-album coming later. Orbit says this will be the
antithesis to "Hello waveforms".

P.S. Weeks before the record came out, Orbit made all the songs from
the album (plus several others) available on his website in 8-track
versions. This means that anyone can download all the songs and make
their own remixes and alternative versions by i.e. removing the vocals
or other parts of the music. This is exceptional so far in music
history, and one can only hope that other major artists follow Orbit's
example and share their music in the same fashion.

A good progression in a new direction
This seems to be a very controversial album judging by the reviews. Like most of the other reviewers I'm a big fan of orbit and have all his albums (including Madonna's Ray of Light). Pieces in a modern style was a big disappointment to me and I really just hate that album, it sucks. The strange cargo series is a timeless set of music that we can keep going back to.

I have also found that to be true for hello waveforms. At the first listen I wasn't really that impressed. But like any good album, it has grown on me in a big way. With each listen I find something new I really like, for example the song "spiral," I initially thought to be nothing more than a lame pop song. But I have really grown to appreciate this track and the incredible vocals.

I think this is a nice change of direction for orbit artistically, it is down tempo and somewhat ambient but has more excitement than pieces in a modern style. Hello Waveforms is my go-to CD for when I'm doing math homework or working on some kind of project. Also lets not forget that there is going to be a second album in 2006 which will likely be more up-tempo judging by the samples of new material that you can preview on www.williamorbit.com.