The Orb - History of the Future

[BobDobalina]

Either way, I love the early Orb albums, and don't give a rat's ass about who played what on them.

 

I take it you've never had someone claim that your work is their's, never mind profit from it? Step in the man's shoes, even if only half of what he asserts is true then he's got legitimate beef fo sure.

 

I don't necessarily agree with the airing of grievances in this manner (except, perhaps during Festivus season), however after reading this I am compelled to reassess certain long-held opinions on le Orb.

Edited July 3, 2014 by Bob Dobalina

[dr lopez]

Thatch, as resident orb expert had always maintained that LX could barely do anything technically. This I can believe. However everyone else's output- fehlmann, youth, cauty, what-have-you has always lacked a certain vibe and panache that makes orb-- u know... Orb. I can believe that coke, acid and everything else addled LX of today is ready to cash in on whatever he can but these disputes also seemed to be beyond his control and left more to the label legal maggots.

 

Seems also possible that he was a real pain in the studio next to real studio and technical wizards but I refuse to admit that he did nothing and doesn't represent a style and character that we associate with classic orb. So I take the rant with lots of salt but also good to hear another angle

[MassfreeKid]

Thrash has his say on the release...

https://krisweston.com/index.php/rant/

Without Patterson and The Orb, who would know Thrash? I understand his feelings, but come on. It's like those engineers saying Steve Jobs can't code. Alright, he can't code, but he has created Apple. The same goes for The Orb. Of course, Alex doesn't do it all. But he is the guy behind The Orb. He is The Orb. He deserves credit where it is due.

[MassfreeKid]

What I have a hard time understanding is why Thrash never contributed any great new music outside of The Orb and FFWD, if he was the genius behind all these classic Orb tracks. Strange eh? You would think he had it in him to compose amazing music and release it to the world under his own name.

[mcbpete]

What I have a hard time understanding is why Thrash never contributed any great new music outside of The Orb and FFWD, if he was the genius behind all these classic Orb tracks. Strange eh? You would think he had it in him to compose amazing music and release it to the world under his own name.

Well there's this: https://krisweston.com/

 

Which appears to be based off this cancelled kickstarter (which doesn't bode well) https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/krisweston/enter-the-fuzzy-dimension?ref=live

 

Shame the kickstarter doesn't give any idea about the music (though interesting to see he uses the almighty Buzz !)

[MassfreeKid]

It's all very interesting but I want to hear some results? I mean obviously, he was in The Orb when the band created some trailblazing music and formed their "classic" status. No doubt about that. I want to believe his story and indeed, Alex seems to be a DJ hiring guns such as Thrash, Hugues and Fehlmann to create music for him to label as The Orb. At least to some degree. But still, why hasn't he been able to produce other great music since 94? This kind of goes against what he is pretending to be, this artist mastermind musical genius behind The Orb in its inception and formative years.

[MassfreeKid]

By the way, I love History of the future. A very nostalgic experience to revisit The Orb during their best years, at least for me. My all-time favorites remain Pomme fritz, Orbus terrarum and Orblivion. And of course, Okie Dokie.

[MassfreeKid]

"well as i said before. lx doesnt play anything or operate any gear. but that doesnt mean he didnt contribute ideas. he did contribute sounds from BBC sound effects records and ahem the tape beatles and others. but generally it wasnt a fully 50/50 effort really. trying to be positive here without ranting. alex would contribute the vocal samples, chicken noises and other conceptual ideas, but i would actually make the music with his samples and my synth/effects/production work."

 

Thrash

 

Source: http://www.gearslutz.com/board/electronic-music-instruments-electronic-music-production/871685-q-kris-weston.html

[MassfreeKid]

[BUNKUM]

"well as i said before. lx doesnt play anything or operate any gear. but that doesnt mean he didnt contribute ideas. he did contribute sounds from BBC sound effects records and ahem the tape beatles and others. but generally it wasnt a fully 50/50 effort really. trying to be positive here without ranting. alex would contribute the vocal samples, chicken noises and other conceptual ideas, but i would actually make the music with his samples and my synth/effects/production work."

 

Thrash

 

Source: http://www.gearslutz.com/board/electronic-music-instruments-electronic-music-production/871685-q-kris-weston.html

That sounds way more like I expected the working relationship to be.

[BUNKUM]

I was also quite shocked at his attacks on Thomas Fehlmann.

[fumi]

Back when I first joined WATMM (October 2004), before the massive database crash and all the date joined data was reset, there was a poster on here called 'Carp Dreamer' who seemed to have some very unique insights into all this contoversy. Haven't seen him post in years now.

[BobDobalina]

Yeah yeah, the Orb isn't the Orb without Alex Pat, that's fair enough, although that doesn't mean he's any less of a twat that he appears to be. This is buried at the bottom of the rant so you can be forgiven if you missed it:

what i feel grieved about is you claiming the credit for my work alex, not even putting my fucking name on it, releasing my work over and over and over again. remastering it without my permission. renaming demos i worked on to other titles and not giving me credit. releasing and cashing in on every piece of shit i even farted near including stuff i have never ever wanted to go out that were just experiments. stealing my track ‘white river junction’ and putting crap over the top of it and then releasing it as your own. taking my intellectual property and whacking it over orb tracks withou asking (causing universal to shit the bed and start drawing up contracts to placate me when i find out ten years after the fact). giving away my royalties to people who had nothing to do with my tracks. putting your name on the PPL royalties for tracks you had nothing to do with, and cant perform anyway because you dont fucking play any instruments you brain dead football loving sheep cunt. leaving the band was the best decision of my life and i have never regretted it for one second.

 

I'd be stark raving mad too if someone so brazenly raped the body of my creative work. Like I posted earlier even if only 1/2 of this is true it seals Alex Pat as a grade AAA fucknut.

[Kooch]

I don't care about the politics of the bands or their egotistical memories.

 

As long as the music is good....although I tend to like their albums where Youth and Fehlmann are involved.

 

This comp. is totally uneeded though, just buy the first few albums and Okie Dokie It's The Orb On Kompakt. (the album before and after Okie Dokie are awful!!!)

[vamos scorcho]

oh fuck off already, you haters. if Alex Patterson isn't responsible for the Orb albums being what they are, then fuck him. I want to reward the person who made those incredible classic electronic albums, not some fucking cunt, with my money

 

end of fucking story

any dipshit who doesn't care that the MAKERS of the records are the ones being compensated are, frankly, clueless pieces of shit

 

to be fair the orb probably can be considered a crossing of different elements

 

i just find it disturbing to think that the people who are really responsible for those albums might not be the ones my money went to. if I could I would put 50$ or more just directly in their pockets in the form of a donation, I would do the same for other artists I like. better than the 3 dollars they get from the 1 7 dollars album I buy of theirs ever 5 years

Edited July 4, 2014 by vamos scorcho

[fumi]

Wasn't Alex Patterdson a PR guy For EG Records back in the 1980s - King Crimson, Brian Eno etc.

[Alcofribas]

It's all very interesting but I want to hear some results? I mean obviously, he was in The Orb when the band created some trailblazing music and formed their "classic" status. No doubt about that. I want to believe his story and indeed, Alex seems to be a DJ hiring guns such as Thrash, Hugues and Fehlmann to create music for him to label as The Orb. At least to some degree. But still, why hasn't he been able to produce other great music since 94? This kind of goes against what he is pretending to be, this artist mastermind musical genius behind The Orb in its inception and formative years.

I disagree with your last sentiment there. why does it go against what he's "pretending to be?" the only way to prove he made some awesome records in the 90s is if he made some other awesome records after that? I don't quite follow.

 

there are many completely normal reasons for a producer to have a limited body of work confined to a particular time period, not everyone can just keep making incredible music for an entire lifetime. sometimes it's just right place, right time kind of thing where the magic just happened to be there. and if you look specifically at his career there are some major setbacks going on, one being the entire saga of his time in the orb and all the bad blood involved. I think it's actually quite common for musicians and bands to get shitty over time, no?

 

I think the question you asked is more revealing the other way around and it seems obvious to me that after he left the quality of the orb totally plummeted, which is why I'm tempted to believe him as far as his creative role is concerned. as for alex being a twat well this isn't the first time I've heard that story so it's not too surprising really.

 

tldr magaret thatcher pls

Edited July 4, 2014 by Alcofribas

[TwiddleBot]

So either everyone else conspired to steal his ideas or he's right, or both, or possibly he is a bit of a control freak who is impossible to work with. He wouldn't be the first talented artist to fall into that category.

It's not like they totally fell apart after he left (tho I can't really get into anything the orb has done post-90s), but certainly he isn't the only member of the group that had talent.

Anyway these are all possibilities. Y

 

Thatch, as resident orb expert had always maintained that LX could barely do anything technically. This I can believe. However everyone else's output- fehlmann, youth, cauty, what-have-you has always lacked a certain vibe and panache that makes orb-- u know... Orb.

Seems also possible that he was a real pain in the studio next to real studio and technical wizards but I refuse to admit that he did nothing

 

Pretty much sums it up, and agreed with the latter point after reading the whole blog. It might be a bit of both. To be perfectly honest he sounds a bit like a control freak at some points in the rant.. hacks ruining my tracks and 'my band' don't fuck with my beds yo! No wonder it didn't work out, especially if the rest of the band was just wanting to get high as kittens and jam. Also the technical production on Orblivion is a step up from previous releases, and even if I think musically Orbus is far, far more interesting, it hardly paints the rest of the crew as inept.

 

You'd think this would be fairly easy to verify if anyone related from that period chimed in (which I assume they won't).

Oh well, interesting to know that one of my fave electronic albums of the 90s (OT) has some serious controversy behind it. Either way Thrash got our attention, and I will be curious to hear his new material. :)

[Guest Hillsman]

I have read the Kris Weston blog from start to finish and I can see no reason to doubt his claims. It is rare these days to get the true inside story about anything, but I guess there are plenty of examples of people profiting from efforts of other more talented, creative or simply harder-working colleagues (I used to be a Civil Servant and this happened A LOT!)

 

The early video game industry is a great example, when programmers and musicians frequently saw only a fraction of a game's total revenues while sales and marketing executives for the various software companies reaped most of the benefits.

 

Kris doesn't help himself in that his blog does come across as a crazed rant at times, but ask yourself this? Has the quality of their output dipped significantly since Orbus Terrarum? I haven't bought an Orb album since Orblivion. I have heard most of their subsequent releases, but other than Okie Dokie (which for me, is a techno album) and Orbsessions Vol 2, nothing has come close to the quality of their earlier stuff.

 

And while I enjoyed Orbus Terrarum at the time, it was always a little bit lacking for me, with only the first 2 tracks sounding anywhere near complete. Now I know why that is. How I would love to have heard it how it was originally intended :(

 

So my intention is to support Kris in his Kickstarter project, though I fear he will fail to raise the money he needs. As for what he has been doing for the past decade, who knows? Depression, anger and bitterness can completely consume a person for the longest time. Perhaps he simply hasn't had the money or the backing to give himself another shot at the big time? But comebacks can and frequently do happen - I wish him every success myself.

[Guest Hillsman]

Further to the above, the 25th anniversary release is a case in point. There is almost nothing new on there. I was wondering why they didn't take this opportunity to put out new versions of the classics or perhaps 12" versions of many of the tracks that appeared on U.F.Off? Now I suspect that the ability to do this simply isn't there. Anyone who has seen The Orb live recently will know that it is basically Thomas Fehlmann standing in front of an Apple Mac (presumably playing DATs) while Paterson twiddles some knobs to bring in various samples - well, that's what it looked like to me!!

 

Shame.

[purlieu]

If what Kris Weston says is true, then the reason Okie Dokie and Baghdad Batteries stand up above the others is that they're basically Thomas Fehlmann albums.

[Jamesqdot]

If what Kris Weston says is true, then the reason Okie Dokie and Baghdad Batteries stand up above the others is that they're basically Thomas Fehlmann albums.

You can really hear that if you compare them to Fehlmann's "Gute Luft", especially Batteries.

[zkom]

I remember Thrash ranting on the Orb mailing list in the early 2000s which was pretty painful to read.

 

I thought it was well established that Patterson was more of an organizer or creative director behind the Orb who got other people to make his ideas reality. There was also this Cauty/Patterson split before Thrash from which came the Chill Out and Space albums. I vaguely remember some fighting over that material also? Cauty calling Patterson "just a DJ" or something to that effect.

[Guest Hillsman]

If what Kris Weston says is true, then the reason Okie Dokie and Baghdad Batteries stand up above the others is that they're basically Thomas Fehlmann albums.

 

I guess that explains that! There is a typo in my post - should've been Orbsessions Vol. 3 (Vol. 2 was terrible)

[Rubin Farr]

Kris has resurfaced trying to fund a new album

 

https://www.patreon.com/100mountains