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History

In 1989, Orbital recorded a track called "Chime" on their father's four-track tape recorder. It was released on Oh Zone Records in December 1989, and re-released on FFRR Records a few months later. The track became a rave anthem, a UK Top 20 hit, and a benchmark for the rest of their career. A few singles and EPs followed, and their first self-titled album was released in late 1991. This was a collection of tracks recorded at various times, and included two live performances. Different formats (LP, CD, tape) each featured a different bonus track, and the American version of the album dropped some tracks from the UK release, to include some single tracks ("Satan", "Chime", "Choice" and "Midnight").

In late 1992 the Radiccio EP barely reached the UK top forty, but it included probably their most well-known song, "Halcyon". The song featured a backwards sample of Kirsty Hawkshaw from "It's a Fine Day" (a chart hit for Opus III earlier that year), and B-side "The Naked and the Dead" was similarly based on a line from Scott Walker's rendition of Jacques Brel's song "Next".

The duo's popularity grew rapidly with the release of their second album, also titled Orbital, in 1993. The album featured complex arrangements and textures, and reached the top of the UK album charts, staying in the top twenty for fifteen weeks. "Halcyon" was remixed for the album, as "Halcyon + On + On". The first two albums are commonly known as "the green album" and "the brown album", after the colour of their covers.

The third album Snivilisation was released in August 1994. Alison Goldfrapp provided vocals on a couple of the tracks, including the single "Are We Here?". Among the remixes of "Are We Here?" was "Criminal Justice Bill?" - four minutes of silence, a reference to the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which was in part intended to clamp down on the rave scene which had given birth to Orbital. The other track with Goldfrapp vocals, "Sad But True", was remixed for the "Times Fly" EP, the band's only release in 1995.

The band became known for their live shows, wearing their trademark head-mounted flashlights behind banks of equipment, and giving an improvisational element to live electronic music as the brothers mixed and sequenced their tracks on the fly. They were one of the few electronic acts invited to play at Woodstock '94. One of the highlights of their career was their headline appearance at the Glastonbury Festival in 1994. Possibly as a result of this show, Q Magazine included them in their list of "50 Bands to See Before You Die".

After a quiet 1995, single "The Box" was released in April 1996, reaching #11 in the UK. Its parent album In Sides revealed a less obviously dance-orientated sound than previously, and had more in common with soundtrack music. As with the previous album, there was a vague theme of ecological disaster and dissatisfaction with society. The following year, the duo contributed to film soundtracks (The Saint, Event Horizon) and enjoyed the biggest singles of their career, with a live version of "Satan" and their reworking of the aforementioned "The Saint" theme both reaching #3 in the UK.

1998 saw a return to the studio to work on their fifth album The Middle of Nowhere. This was released in 1999, and was a return to a more upbeat style, with Alison Goldfrapp returning on vocals and the single "Style" (incorporating stylophone sounds). In 2000 a single was released from the soundtrack to the film The Beach, mixing the brothers' musical style with a melody by Angelo Badalamenti and the words of Leonardo DiCaprio from the film.

2001's The Altogether featured guest vocals by the Hartnolls' brother-in-law David Gray, a sampled Ian Dury, and a version of the Doctor Who theme. It was to be their last album for FFRR, and had a mixed critical reception. The following year, Work 1989-2002 collected various singles from "Chime" onwards.

Orbital split up in 2004. They played a final series of gigs from June through July 2004 at the Glastonbury Festival, the T in the Park Festival in Scotland, the Oxegen festival (formerly known as Witnness) in Ireland, and the Wire Festival in Japan, concluding with a live Peel Session gig at Maida Vale Studios in London on July 28, 2004. The release of their seventh and last original album, The Blue Album (which, unlike the untitled previous green and brown albums, was actually named "The Blue Album"), coincided with this final wave of shows. The album featured Sparks (on "Acid Pants"), Lisa Gerrard (on the final single "One Perfect Sunrise"), and a speech by Christopher Ecclestone from the TV film The Second Coming.

Paul Hartnoll is continuing to record music under his own name, including tracks for the new Wipeout Pure game for the PSP. Phil Hartnoll is concentrating on forming a new electronica duo, LongRange, with Nick Smith. LongRange will have a fairly similar sound to Orbital.

Soundtracks

Orbital remade the theme tune to the 1997 film The Saint; the song "The Box" also appeared in that film. "The Saint" is featured on some editions of In Sides, their fourth album. They made a version of the Doctor Who theme tune, featured on The Altogether. They also created the original soundtrack for the film Octane, and collaborated with composer Michael Kamen on the soundtrack album of the film Event Horizon. Orbital created the song "Technologicque Park" for the film xXx in which they actually appear during the night club/rave sequence. A shortened version of Orbital's song "Halcyon + On + On" was the theme to the 1995 film Hackers and was featured in the soundtracks for 1995's Mortal Kombat, 2000's Groove, 2001's CKY2K, and 2004's Mean Girls. Their song "Sad But True" was used in the soundtrack to Johnny Mnemonic. The song "P.E.T.R.O.L" from the album "In Sides" appears in 1998's Pi.

Some of their music has also been used as soundtracks for differing versions of the game "Wipeout", latest "Wipeout Fusion"

Trivia

  • Orbital are known for incorporating political and social comment into their music. For example, "Desert Storm" on their first album is a response to the first Gulf War, while much of their fourth album In Sides is inspired by ecological themes. On a more personal level, "Halcyon" (and the more well known remix, "Halcyon + on + on") was inspired by the Hartnolls' mother's tranquiliser addiction. They also have a few songs that relate to environmentalism, such as "Dŵr Budr" ("dirty water" in Welsh), "P.E.T.R.O.L.", and "Kein Trink Wasser" ("not drinking water" in German).

  • Orbital is sometimes confused with The Orb, a similarly named band that has also been very influential in the realm of electronic music. In its early days, The Orb often did remixes of other artists' songs and called the result an "Orbital Mix", but these remixes have nothing to do with the band Orbital. The Orb stopped this practice after Orbital became popular, hoping not to cause any more confusion.

  • Tilda Swinton appeared in the music video for the Orbital track, "The Box".

Selected discography

Albums

Singles/EPs

See also

External links

Orbital at Last.fm

Peel Sessions artists | Electronic music groups | Techno music groups | House music groups | English musical groups | Remixers | 1980s music groups | 1990s music groups | 2000s music groups

Orbital (Band) | Orbital | Orbital | オービタル | Orbital (zespół muzyczny) | Orbital | Orbital (musikgrupp)

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Orbital (band)".

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