Jan Steele / Ziz ! Ensemble ‎– Desert Island Dusks

Label: Les Disques Du Soleil Et De L'Acier – DSA 54007
Series: Labyrinthes – 2
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album
Country: France
Released: 1986
Genre: Electronic, Jazz, Rock, Classical
Style: Experimental

Lovingly eccentric evocations from two unsung giants of underground British music, Janet Sherbourne and Jan Steel aka Ziz ! Ensemble.  Desert island disc.

A record that eternally brings us true joy.  As we’ve gushed on here previously, the work of Janet Sherbourne, alongside collaborators Jan Steel and Mark Locket ranks amongst some of the best UK underground music of the 1980s.  Despite first appearing on Eno’s legendary Obscure label series, their mostly self-released works became and remains criminally overlooked outside of record collector circles.  Their works are permeated with an adorable regional British quirkiness, equally compelled to undertake goofy art-salon exotica as they are strange psudo-gamelan or lovestruck late night vocal ballads.  Essentially, anything they touch turns to gold.  We’re here for it all.  Desert Island Dusks is a mixed bag to say the least, released in disappointedly small numbers on the short-lived French Labyrinthes series on Les Disques Du Soleil Et De L'Acier but offers a charming potpourri of what these two are about.  Two of Janet’s most enduring compositions in ‘Ivory’ and ‘Nobody But You’ feature here in slightly different versions from her self-released 7”, demonstrating her generational vocal talents across two arrestingly beautiful pieces of minimal chamber music, whilst Mary Ashford Music is a plaintive movement for solo piano played by Jan Steel that feels rooted in Satie’s ageless simplicity.  A perfectly imperfect record with a charm that continues to improve with age.  (NM - with printed inner).

Tracklist
A1        Desert Island Dusks    5:09
A2        Ivory    5:40
A3        The Victoria Incident / Has Ras    5:12
A4        City Night Music    2:58
B1        Nobody But You    4:56
B2        Mary Ashford Music    3:01
B3        Motorway Music    4:25
B4        Ludo Funka Toniko    7:22