QuietMelodies is now open!

As many of you might already know, the new portal is finally open!!!!!  I am so sorry that it has taken so long to happen, but I do hope you find it worth the wait.  Some of the new features you will be able to enjoy are being able to message any member & being able to post your own favorites.  There will also be a forum added so that requests and such can be made there.  Eventually hope to in essence mirror this blog there and of course have new content available.  The new music available should be substantially more than here as there will be multiple people posting =-).  Please stop by and join your NEW home for QuietMusic – www.quietmelodies.com!

Michel Sanchez (Deep Forest) – Windows

Michel Sanchez (Deep Forest) – Windows
MP3 @ 160 Kbps | 58:26 min | 1994 | 73.9 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Michel Sanchez is a member of Deep Forest. This solo CD was recorded in 1994. Of course, it`s not as good as “World Mix”, “Boheme” or “Music Detected”, but this CD much more interesting than other albums by Deep Forest. It starts from dynamic song “Tholos”. Tholos means a kind of mysterious sanctauries or tombs, which were built from gigantic stones in Europe in Neolithic Age. The album is a mix of dynamic and slow light instrumental electronic melodies with many samples of ethnic singing (one thing is bad – there are no any commentaries by Sanchez or references to the sources of this samples). If such an album was recorded, say, by David Byrne or Eno it could be a sensation! So if you like early Deep Forest – you would like this CD. A must for every fan of DF.

Deep Forest & Enigma – Myth (Chorus of Tribes)

Deep Forest & Enigma – Myth (Chorus of Tribes)
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 58:52 min | 2000 | 145 MB | 10% Recovery Record

If you ever wised that Deep Forest and Enigma would release a CD together, well your wish as been answered. Almost at least. The sound is so amazingly true to both Enigma’s & Deep Forest’s earlier work, while at the same time the music has evolved to newer sounds. From beginning to end this CD is pure pleasure to the ears. Lullaby has a sound that if unsuspected, one would swear it was Enigma and Deep Forest together. With Enigmatic drum patterns and chimes, and Deep Forest rhythems and vocals, this CD would not disappoint anyone. If you are looking for the sounds of the two groups earlier work, this is the CD for you. At times the music is even better than the original groups. This CD gets an A+

Michel Sanchez (Deep Forest) – Hieroglyphes

Michel Sanchez (Deep Forest) – Hieroglyphes
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 59:31 min | 2000 | 145 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Michel Sanchez, who also gave us the infectious “Deep Forest” albums, is a master talent. His previous solo outing, “Windows,” was one of my favorite albums of 1998, so I couldn’t wait to get my ears on this new release. Believe it or not, this new record, “Hieroglyphs,” makes the wild and wonderful “Windows” seem almost tame by comparison. Think of what might happen if there were a collaborative effort among Weather Report, New York Voices, Cirque du Soleil, and Rob Mounsey’s Flying Monkey Orchestra — all pumped up on steroids — and you begin to get the idea. Sanchez, with his amazing ability to mesh various musical styles and vivid tone colors (not to mention his impeccable keyboard virtuosity), will turn your ear every which way but loose! While “Deep Forest” fans may or may not be able to keep up, Sanchez definitely runs ahead of the pack on this one!

Deep Forest – World Mix

Deep Forest – World Mix
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 1:16:38 min | 1998 | 188 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Reissue of the internationally flavored, French da nce act’s remix album. Feauting 15 tracks in all. Highlights include, ‘Sweet Lullaby (Ambient Mix), (Round The World Mix), (Apollo Mix), ‘Deep Forest (Sunrise At Alctraz Mix)’, ‘Forest Hymn (Apollo Mix), ‘Hunting’, ‘Night Bird’, ‘Desert Walk’ & more.

Deep Forest – Super Best

Deep Forest – Super Best
MP3 @ 192 Kbps | 1:02:46 min | 1999 | 94.9 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Deep Forest – Pangea

Deep Forest – Pangea
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 50:19 min | 1996 | 122 MB | 10% Recovery Record

This CD was brought home as a bit of a gamble . . you can’t always tell by the cover. Since it was first put on the CD drawer a week ago it’s been played continually – I can’t get enough of it. Reminiscent of Deep Forest, Enigma and plenty of other bands whose names escape me, it’s haunting, beautiful, catchy, and addictive. I love it. I just wish I could sing along.

Deep Forest – Pacifique

Deep Forest – Pacifique
MP3 @ 256 Kbps | 49:34 min | 2000 | 101 MB | 10% Recovery Record

This is the Japanese release of Pacifique, a soundtrack done for a French film. This CD contains a bonus track, “Huahine Reggae part 2”, as well as a bonus multimedia feature. It is missing one track that’s on the French release, “La légende part 1” – 0:46. A must-have for Deep Forest collectors.

Deep Forest – Music Detected

Deep Forest – Music Detected
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 56:35 min | 2002 | 138 MB | 10% Recovery Record

This is certainly not an album that many people have heard of (much less the band Deep Forest!). I’ve owned it for a number of years and enjoyed it quite a bit, and I was very surprised to see how few reviews exist for MUSIC DETECTED.

I’ve been a fan of Deep Forest for many years, and have enjoyed listening as their style shifted from the electro influenced chill (infused with the overlay of indigenous language) of Deep Forest to the African centric rhythm and beats of Comparsa. In Music Detected, there is an Asian quality to some of the tracks, and especially the vocals.

This album is a romp through music styles with dance beats commingling with classical lyric construction. It is joyful, melancholy, teeming with the energy that Deep Forest has always been able to capture in their music. The songs might be dissimilar to their previous offering in their use of heavy beats and English lyrics, but they still convey the same power and authenticity of their older albums.

Stand out tracks include:

Soul Elevator
Computer Machine
Beauty In Your Eyes
Will You Be Ready

A fun, interesting, and surprisingly danceable album, MUSIC DETECTED makes me hungry for a new Deep Forest album to settle in to. Perhaps soon.

Deep Forest – Made In Japan [Live]

Deep Forest – Made In Japan [Live]
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 40:02 min | 1999 | 97.6 MB | 10% Recovery Record

We never expected a live album from Deep Forest, the two French keyboardists (Eric Monquet and Michel Sanchez) whose stylishly peculiar music (ambient meets dance meets Pygmy vocalese) is a laboratory-like concoction of clever sampling, synthesizers, and studio savvy. Sanchez, in fact, confesses to stage fright. Yet here we find the two lads on a Tokyo stage in 1998, accompanied by four musicians and three singers, breathing life–at times, even fire–into their digitally spliced global village. It’s a different sound for the group, and mostly an invigorating one. The real-time human element permeating Made in Japan infuses DF’s carefully crafted atmospheres with an energizing vitality and sense of spontaneity. Any absence of studio sophistication in Deep Forest’s live sound is compensated for by the music’s celebratory mood and the concert’s interactive, transcultural, communal environment. This serves to reinforce an ongoing subtext in Deep Forest’s aesthetic–the desire to draw a musical thread through the mystical pursuits of far-flung cultures. Highlights: the beguiling grooves of “Bohemian Ballet,” the mysterious propulsion of “Café Europa,” and the groove-fueled choir that drives “Forest Power.”

Deep Forest – Kusa No Ran

Deep Forest – Kusa No Ran
MP3 @ 224 Kbps | 43:20 min | 2004 | 75.7 MB | 10% Recovery Record

But even though Deep Forest has produced music for movies before, there are several suprises on the new score of Kusa no Ran.  One of the big ones being that there are 23 tracks, two composed by Michel Sanchez and all the rest by Eric Mouquet!  It’s sort of a departure from the team effort that fans are used to seeing from the musical duo, at least under the name Deep Forest.

Deep Forest – Forest Best

Deep Forest – Forest Best
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 1:05:52 min | 2000 | 161 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Deep Forest – Essence Of The Forest

Deep Forest – Essence Of The Forest
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 1:17:40 min | 2004 | 167 MB | 10% Recovery Record

Deep Forest’s greatest hits collection finally sees a stateside release, albeit with a drastically different tracklisting to its import counterparts. While imports versions tend to be better in this case neither version is truly satisfactory. The US release offers Deep Forest’s biggests hits “sweet lullaby” (in a slightly remixed form) and “marta’s song” as well smart choices like “ekue ekue” and “twosome.” These songs really showcase the act’s ability create modern vocal pop songs from ethnic chants and old folk songs. The US collection sadly omits the duo’s collaboration with Peter Gabriel on “while the earth sleeps.” Neither domestic nor import release give a nod to “Pacifique” – the soundtrack they scored. The US tracklisting works well despite its noticeable omissions. It does try to make up with the inclusion of the Deep forest remix of “undecided” for artist Youssou N’dour. If you are a casual fan of deep forest or relaxing world music this is a great hits package. For fans of the group this album may be a huge disappointment and it may be worth seeking out one of the 2 import versions that exists.

Deep Forest – Deep Forest

Deep Forest – Deep Forest
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 41:04 min | 1993 | 103 MB | 10% Recovery Record

This record is a must have, because it defined a new era of crossover-style music. It took Pygmies and put them to an Enigma beat, with an occasional broken English (Dutch syntax?) commentary. Sounds cheezy, but it really works.

The band describes themselves as not a band. “Deep Forest” is a project, according to its creators. Therefore, the album is a stand-alone work, except that it enjoyed such an unpredicted success that it spawned a series of projects.

I first bought this album as an import in the early 90’s. “Sweet Lullaby” had been getting some pretty frequent radio play on the San Francisco alternative rock stations, and it was simply intriguing. Nobody had ever heard voices like this. Mix in ambient jungle sounds. Synthetic beat. What a combination? Sound strange? It’s not that different from what we hear today from Fatboy Slim and Moby, except of course with Pygmies. I don’t think many have dared to replicate it.

Deep Forest – Deep Brasil

Deep Forest – Deep Brasil
MP3 @ 192 Kbps | 54:46 min | 2008 | 83.3 MB | 10% Recovery Record

The primordial unknown–or the modern urban dweller’s impressions thereof–has long been a staple of New Age music. So it was only a matter of time before some studio whiz got the notion to take the translation process one step further and bring that atmosphere to the dance floor. It’s definitely authentic–the creators studied and borrowed genuine chants from African tribes–but just as importantly, it’s remarkably seductive. The chart-topping signature song, “Sweet Lullaby,” is indicative of what’s going on in the grooves of the other nine tracks; ambient house beats burble pastorally while “multi-culti” samples ebb and flow gracefully, even romantically, through the mix.

Deep Forest – Comparsa

Deep Forest – Comparsa
MP3 @ 320 Kbps | 50:08 min | 1998 | 123 MB | 10% Recovery Record

I’ve been a fan of Deep Forest since their first album, and I was also very impressed with Boheme, their second release. However, over time I found their first album became rather simplistic, and Boheme somewhat uneven. However, COMPARSA, their third album, is without peer.

What is fantastic about this CD is the incredible attention to detail. There are MANY tracks of sound throughout, including dazzling arrays of complimentary keyboard work, deliciously intricate percussion, and expertly weaved vocal lines. The boys have become very adept with their computers, and the samples are spliced with infinite care and virtuosity. Simply marvelous!

Deep Forest – Boheme

Deep Forest – Boheme
MP3 @ 128 Kbps | 42:43 min | 1995 | 43.5 MB | 10% Recovery Record

A magnificent piece. One of my early explorations in Ambient World Electronica, it remains among my highest rated. I also own Deep Forest III, Comparasa, but return to Boheme more often. Great for fans of the genre; the vocalizations may stretch your current paradigm. Also a great experience for people looking to expand their musical preferences.