artist: Woob country of origin: UK style(s): Ambient, sound collage, ethno-ambient, cinematic essential releases: Woob (1994, Emit/Instinct/woob.info) Woob 2 (1995, Emit) Repurpose (2010, woob.info)

The music of Paul Frankland is cinema of the mind with very few peers: intelligent, musical, vivid and emotional. His first two albums as Woob are among the most refined, subtle and innovative examples of the meeting between electronics and live instruments that flowered in the ambient environment of the 1990's on UK ambient label Emit Records.

The first album simply called Woob is highly revered by Emit fans and arguably the greatest single artist album Emit ever released. Its a hybrid of melodic synthscapes, slow tribal grooves, avant-garde sound collage and Third World instrument sampling that defies mere categories. The ideas are so focused and execution is so assured that even the 30 minute opener "On Earth" doesn't drag. The visuals are strong; some tracks play like a surreal movie allowing the listener any number of interpretations. It's music of light and shadow, capable of making you melt or making you jump. "Strange Air" builds tension slowly, playing with synth drones and dialogue samples from an old suspense film for over 10 minutes before suddenly scaring the hell out of you.

Woob 2 takes another surreal journey but is markedly different from the debut. This time it's though some deep, dark tropical jungle teeming with life, an aural travelogue filled simultaneously with visions of beauty and lurking, unseen menace. Once again, Franklin's mix of electronics and live instrumentation is quietly dazzling - drums, bass, electric guitar - and here he adds further to his palette with some smart touches of flute and piano. There’s less melody and harmonies and more thumping, dubby grooves than on the first album, though the 25-minute “Depart” drops the beats to a whisper and opts for a dreamy, disorientating flight through some mountainous inner landscape.

After the 2nd Woob album and the demise of Emit Records, Frankland continued for a while making music under his less well-known moniker Journeyman which had existed since 1994. Under this name he's released weird clanging dub and mutant drum'n'bass, but also the stunningly beautiful and melodic ambient epic "Latneiro (Woob's Sunrise dub)" - one of his very best creations.

Then in 2010 he suddenly re-emerged with his Woob project and a new album Repurpose. Dubbed by the composer as the spiritual successor to his debut album, Repurpose is an unexpected delight. Two long new tracks bookend the release and showcase the Woob universe in all its distinctive glory: shimmering, pulsing loops of tonal colour, creepy movie dialogue, lush orchestral and choral samples, slow euphoric crescendos and widescreen sound design. "85-bit" has a lot of fun with old synth sounds including a Commodore 64 and yet it sounds timeless, slowly building into a chugging, Berlin-school monster with multi-layered melodies. Sandwiched between these two new epics are remixes and reinventions of older Woob tracks, mostly from Woob 2 and various Emit Records compilations. The remixes are generally warmer and more tonal than the originals. The exception is the wonderfully dark and cinematic "Stranger Air", a direct nod to "Strange Air" from his debut.

With the original Woob CD's from Emit long out of print and fetching ridiculous prices on internet auction sites, digital download stores including Paul Frankland's own site www.woob.info are the best places to buy his albums.

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