low light mixes

    I have been making stargazing and space themed mixes for a long time. But I realized that I haven't posted a straightforward stargazing mix for almost two years. So this mix fixes that. All the tracks are fairly new, with half of them being from this year. Some tracks are from low light mixes regulars like Loscil, Loneward and Hipnotic Earth alongside new discoveries like RIKAAR, Tone Color an...

    Here's a new mix in the "Simply Ambient" series. There is no theme, no story, no big concept - just straightforward ambient music. All the tracks are from 2022 and all the tracks are...Undeniably Ambient. Cheers!   T R A C K L I S T : 00:00 Innesti -  A Collection of Ideas (Folding, A Study 2022) 04:50 Andarctica - Basalt (Basal 2022) 09:00 Gylden - Into The Night (Island Friend 2022) 13:15 Jo...

    Yes, another train mix. They are just too intriguing and cinematic to pass up. This one come from friend of the blog, Paul Asbury Seaman. Paul has given us some excellent train mixes in the past and this one continues that tradition. This one clocks in at just a bit under 100 minutes! So much great music in one mix.   Here's what Paul says about this set:   “A special summertime extended-play...

  About a month ago I presented a guest mix of sleep music from Brian Bieniowski, whom I knew from the heyday of the Hypnos Records forum in the mid 2000s. "That Beautiful Land of Nod" is indeed a beautiful sleep mix.  Thankfully, back in 2007 Brian created two Land of Nod mixes. So here is volume 2 for your listening and sleeping pleasure. Here is what Brian said about the Land of Nod mixes back...

    Peter van Cooten runs the excellent Ambientblog website which has great reviews and, of course, wonderful mixes. Anytime Peter reaches out with a mix idea or a a set he'd like to cross-post on both of our platforms, I will always jump at the chance. As I said on Peter's last guest mix, his sets are different from mine in that they are more intricate. He does not use full tracks, instead opting...

    It was a little more than ten years ago that I posted my first Sunday Morning Music mix. I had not intended on making it a regular series but the mix did very well on Mixcloud and is partially responsible for starting the explosion of followers the Low Light Mixes feed got in the following years. So I've been creating roughly two per years for 10 years. Yikes! It's kind of crazy to think about...

    Set the wayback machine to 2007. I started creating ambient mixes back in the mid-2000s. Those were the days before social media had taken over our lives, before Bandcamp was such a great resource for ambient music.  Back then I spent a lot of time on the Hypnos Records forum. There, a bunch of like-mined music nerds shared comments about new recordings, gear, movies, books, tv, music trends,...

  I made the first Guitarissimo mix 5 years ago. I followed it up a year or so later. But then for some reason it took me 4 years to get to volume 3. This version is similar to the others the vibe is a bit spaghetti western and dusty, moody, twangy with a little Latin feel. But of course much of it has an ambient vibe. One of my favorite discoveries while making this mix was Hermanos Gutiérrez. As...

  I've been a fan of the Deutsche Grammophon label for a long time, ever since I got this Steve Reich box set back in the early 80s in college. I've collected quite a few DG recordings over the years. Over the last 5 years or so I've noticed them branching out and releasing music by a wider variety of artists and music that isn't strictly classical. From Moby to Christian Löffler to Olafur Arnald...

    I am always pleased to present a new mix from Paul Asbury Seaman and this one is no exception. It's a great collection of sequencer tracks that hits the ideal vibe. Coming on the heels of my Stranger Synths mix, I was still in a electronic, sequencer mood and this mix kept me in that zone perfectly. Here's what Paul says about this mix: “For a lot of people, the term ‘electronic music’ still b...

    For a while now I've been planning on a drum/percussion mix similar to A Distant Pulse -  https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/a-distant-pulse/   and A Rhythmic Passage -  https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/a-rhythmic-passage/   In my search for tracks I came across a track by Vidna Obmana called "The Transcending Quest." It made me nostalgic for the heyday of tribal ambient in the 1990s with arti...

  It's been three years since the last season of Netflix's Stranger Things. Now with the 4th season upon us it must be time for a new mix - Stranger Synths 2022. Similar to previous version of Stranger Synths, this takes the retro vibe of the show's soundtrack and collects tracks that sound like they would fit perfectly in the TV series. I wasn't planning on doing a mix this time around until I st...

    We lost Klaus a few weeks ago and now Vangelis. I'm getting tired of doing these tribute mixes. His music was my electronic soundtrack to the 80s. I played the daylights out of Antarctica and Soil Festivities back then. And then of course there is Blade Runner. I am still in awe of that soundtrack today. I don't know what else to say other than I loved his music. Godspeed Evángelos Odysséas Pa...

    Seven years ago I did a mix called "Space Rock" that is unique in the Low Light Mixes catalog. It's a collection of instrumental tunes that are guitar driven and are a bit spacey, a little prog rock, and with some post-rock tossed in as well. You can find to original mix here: http://lowlightmixes.blogspot.com/2015/04/space-rock.html I've always wanted to do a follow-up mix but never got aroun...

    A new album from Tapes and Topographies dropped last week and as expected it is very good. Tapes & Topographies is one of my favorite ambient artists so I asked if they would do a guest mix. And I am happy to present "A Faint Resemblance". I'm stealing this background info from friend of the blog, Harry Towell over at Whitelabrecs. "Tapes and Topographies is US based artist Todd Gautreau, who...

  Klaus Schulze 1947 - 2022 Klaus Schulze, considered to be a godfather figure in electronic music, died this week. I'd say he was one of the big four of early electronic music pioneers which in addition to Schulze would include Jean-Michel Jarre, Kraftwerk, and Tangerine Dream.  I've always enjoyed his music but I was a bigger fan of the other three artists in that group. That being said, somehow...

    Here's the latest in a series of simple, straightforward ambient mixes. It started with Simply Ambient then we also had Always Ambient, Purely Ambient, and Absolutely Ambient. This is a mix with no theme or story or concept. Just excellent ambient tracks. All the cuts used here are from 2022. Here are links to the music used in this mix in the order in which they appear: https://krysalisound.b...

  I love doing these alternative soundtrack mixes. I believe this is the fifth one I made. Sometimes I have the mix take the soundtrack in a different direction and sometimes I simply follow the vibe of the original with all new tracks. This mix takes the later approach. For anyone not familiar with it, Severance is a series on AppleTV+, an eerie dystopia where people can sever their work life fro...

  "Listening in the Dark" is such a great title for an ambient mix. I've listened to a lot of these mixes in the dark - sitting on the deck at night, in bed before sleep, stargazing, etc. I wonder how many folks purposely listen to ambient & electronic music in the dark. I remember playing the Conet Project recordings in the dark and a friend said it was a little too freaky. This mix is definitely...

  International Piano day takes place on the 88th day of the year, in honor of the number of keys on a piano keyboard. In 2022 that day is March 29th. So, as in years past, I have put together a mix of piano tracks to celebrate Piano Dat 2022. This set starts off a bit different from those I've done before. Most are solo piano type mixes but this one starts off with 5 tracks that have more of an e...

  This mix is perfect for spring. Here the rain is the main attraction. It dominates the sound. I purposely mixed the audio from the music fairly low so that it sounds like it's playing in the background somewhere.   I did a similar mix back in August of 2020 - https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/rainfall-meditation/ and this one is the same idea. Enjoy this mix as winter snow turns to spring rain....

   The spoken word in music is a tricky thing. A lot of people really dislike it. And I totally get that. Most of the time I think it's distracting or annoying or cheesy. But obviously someone like Laurie Anderson is able to pull it off successfully. If I use a track with spoken word in an ambient mix it can ruin the mood so I decided to make an entire mix featuring tracks with spoken word. What g...

    The first time I used a track from Altus in a mix was 10 years ago. I've been a fan ever since. Altus is Mike Carss, who also records as Loneward. Between those two musical personas, I've used Mike's music in 10 mixes. https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/music-for-a-mars-landing/ https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/deep-sky-time-music-for-stargazing-2013/ https://www.mixcloud.com/lowlight/eight-da...

  Ugh, the world sure could use a time out and some meditation to bring the temperature down a notch. So here's a collection of calming tracks for meditation, reading, a bubble bath or just staring off into space for an hour. Here are links to the albums used in this mix in the order in which they appear: https://auralcanyonmusic.bandcamp.com/album/listening-sky https://jonhopkins.bandcamp.com/alb...

    I am a lucky guy. Lucky, because I get to present a second guest in as many weeks. Lucky, because I was able to discover new artists in this excellent mix. And lucky because I am also lazy and these guest mixes allow me to put some beautiful music out there with the heavy lifting done by someone else.  This mix comes to us from J. Gorecki who records as Fragile X, a musician/producer from Glas...