Bleep

All Saints Records once again blows the dust off a classic volume in ambient music with this second reissue of Harold Budd’s beloved 1988 LP The White Arcades. Recorded in partnership with contemporaries (Brian Eno) and disciples (Cocteau Twins’ Robin Guthrie), The White Arcades signalled something of a renaissance for the American, bringing new ears to his masterful minimalism, and a reappraisal of his deep oeuvre. As for the album itself, it stands as one of Budd’s finest efforts, with tracks like ‘Balthus Bemused By Color’ and ‘Totems Of The Red-Sleeved Warrior’ distilling elements of the contemporary electronic ambient movement, but foregrounding them in his own more classic-leaning modes to produce something virtually timeless.

“Although its aura is ethereal and unworldly, Budd's music is actually an exemplary form of humanly useful music. When the mundane urgencies of life, or the nonsense of our political culture, get you frazzled, which is pretty much every day these days, you can put on this music and imbibe its stillness and grace. His records are exactly the kind of music you'd play for calm and solace during a bereavement — or at a service sending someone to their final resting place. Harold Budd sounds like heaven on earth.” Simon Reynolds