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Thomas Dolby - The Flat Earth (84 ^99mb)
 Thomas Dolby (born Thomas Morgan Robertson, on 14 October 1958) is an English musician, producer, and inventor. Thomas was father, Martin Robertson, was an internationally-distinguished professor of classical Greek art and archaeology at the University of London and Oxford University, and in his youth Thomas lived or worked in Greece and France. Thomas married actress Kathleen Beller in 1988; the couple have three children together. Dolby's interest in music arose through his interest in computers, electronics and synthesizers. He originally attended college to study meteorology, but he was soon side-tracked by electronics, specifically musical equipment. He began building his own synthesizers when he was 18 years old. Around the same time, he began to learn how to play guitar and piano, as well as how to program computers. The "Dolby" nickname comes from the name Dolby Laboratories, and was given to him by school friends due to his seemingly inseparable relationship with his cassette machine. Dolby Laboratories tried to stop him from using the name Dolby entirely. Eventually, the case was settled out of court and it was agreed that he would refrain from using the word Dolby in any context other than with the name Thomas. In his late teens, Dolby was hired as a touring sound engineer for a variety of post-punk bands, including the Fall, the Passions and the Members; on these dates, he would use a PA system he had built himself. In 1979, he formed the arty post-punk band Camera Club with Bruce Woolley, Trevor Horn, Geoff Downes and Matthew Seligman. Within a year, he had left the group and joined Lene Lovich's backing band. Dolby gave Lovich his song "New Toy," which became a British hit in 1981. That same year, he released his first solo single, "Urges," on the English independent label Armageddon. By the fall, he had signed with Parlophone and released "Europa and the Pirate Twins." Dolby started playing synthesizer on sessions for other artists in 1982. He wrote and produced "Magic's Wand" for Whodini; the single became one of the first million-selling rap singles. Even with all of these achievements, 1982 was most noteworthy for the release of Dolby's first solo album, The Golden Age of Wireless, in the summer of 1982; the record reached number 13 in England, while it was virtually forgotten in America. "Windpower," the first single from the record, became his first Top 40 UK hit . Dolby's second album, The Flat Earth holds up considerably well since its 1984 release. This staying power belongs to a fantastic ensemble of supporting players as much as to Dolby's songwriting and crisp production. The album was supported by the single "Hyperactive." The single became his biggest UK hit. Though The Flat Earth did relativly well in the US , Dolby's momentum was already beginning to slow -- none of the singles released from the album cracked the American Top 40. Nevertheless, Dolby was in demand as a collaborator and he worked with Herbie Hancock, Howard Jones, Stevie Wonder, George Clinton, and Dusty Springfield. During 1985, he produced Clinton's Some of My Best Jokes Are Friends, Prefab Sprout's Steve McQueen (Two Wheels Good in the US), and Joni Mitchell's Dog Eat Dog, as well as supporting David Bowie at Live Aid. Also in 1985, he began composing film scores, starting with Fever Pitch. In 1986, he composed the scores for Gothic and Howard the Duck, to which he credited himself as Dolby's Cube. Aliens Ate My Buick, Dolby's long-delayed third album, appeared in 1988 to poor reviews and weak sales, even though the single "Airhead" became a minor British hit. For the rest of the late '80s and early '90s, Dolby continued to score films, producing and he began building his own computer equipment. His fourth album, Astronauts & Heretics, was released in 1992 on his new label, Giant the album was a flop. The following year, Dolby founded the computer software company Headspace, which released The Virtual String Quartet as its first program. For the rest of the '90s, Headspace occupied most of Dolby's time and energy. In 1994, he released The Gate to the Mind's Eye, a soundtrack to the videotape Mind's Eye. Also that year, Capitol released the greatest-hits collection, Retrospectacle. 1 - Dissidents (4:57) 2 - The Flat Earth (6:41) 3 - Screen Kiss (5:33) 4 - White City (5:20) 5 - Mulu The Rain Forest (5:00) 6 - I Scare Myself (5:36) 7 - Hyperactive! (4:14) --Xs 8 - Dissidents (the search for truth pt 2) (5:54) Links |
