Influences: Lamb

“This track is the sound of my childhood. When I hear it I’m back in our family home on a farm in the north of England. My mum was a folk singer and a bit of a hippy and they used to throw cool parties where people would come wearing afghan coats, smoking “roll-ups” and bringing their guitars for a jam and listening to a lot of CSN. I love the three part harmonies and the breezy spaciousness of the music.” – Lou

“I love the pure melodic harp, balanced with the unsettled, over-compressed drums. I think one of the most effective tools in composition is light and dark. Without being conscious about it, we do the same with Lamb – countering Lou’s warm vocals with unsettling bass lines and atmospheres, which gives more depth and keeps it fresh somehow.” – Andy

“Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works 85-92 was a constant on my turntable in the early 90s and became a kind of soundtrack to that time. I guess in a way it was a bridge between my acoustic roots and starting to explore electronic music. Hearing this I’m back in the old coach-house I lived in in West Didsbury, Manchester, sun streaming into the first floor loft-space that was my flat with my photograghy studio below which later became a workspace for early lamb demos on New Order’s old
four-track.” – Lou

“I found this years ago on an amazing compilation called Angels In The Architecture. Its beautiful wind topline grounds the seamlessly random time signatures of the percussion. Empty, sparse but never cold… beautiful.” – Andy

“Gerald’s 1995 album Black Secret Technology was a formative influence on Lamb’s debut. Back then, with no Internet, you often heard the cool new stuff on Manchester’s many pirate stations and early break-beat was just breaking through. Gerald was a friend and had been around on the dance music scene for a while. We hung out a little in Manchester but Humanity was recorded after he’d moved to London in his studio under the Hammersmith flyover. We did the vocal on a handheld SM58 in the control room with G’s mates coming and going and the fluidity of
the track seems to reflect the whole vibe of its creation.” – Lou

“Circlesongs is the album, and the whole album is sublime. Just voices. No samples, beats or even other melodic instruments, a dozen African singers doing rounds. I love that there aren’t any lyrics – just sounds, all created from humans. It captures a very special spirit, which even after hundreds of plays captures an intense, but gentle, spirit.” – Andy

“Sufjan’s songs have a kind of genius I can’t quite grasp. As a fellow songwriter he inspires me hugely. He writes like a novelist (apparently that was his initial plan), often in the third person and I’m never quite sure if the “I” he uses refers to him. His music varies between paired-down purity and almost overpowering richness and defies categorisation. It’s really hard for me to choose one track but this one touches me deeply whenever I hear it, expressing a searing vulnerability in his angelic voice and beautifully delicate instrumentation.” – Lou

“This is on my favourite album to listen to in bed album. All of the tracks on the record are named after how long they are- really exceptionally simple, no beats to ground it in this reality. Lamb were lucky enough to have Global Communication collaborate on a remix of Gorecki (the only remix which we commissioned on that song) I wasn’t a huge fan of their mix for months until I heard it out in a night club, and realised how genius it was.” – Andy