Exclusive Shindig! Qobuz playlist #18: Ice Diving – Glacial Electronic Music 1974-85

We’re very excited to be media partners with the truly unique online streaming platform and download store Qobuz. This month, the 18th of our monthly bespoke playlists, which take in all manner of genres and sub-genres, scenes and beyond, then and now, pulls together some chilly electronic creations and soundscapes

Play here or use the scrollable frame with tracklist the bottom of the page. You can sign up for a free trial today. Plans start from £10.83 per month. For more on Qobuz read our interview with MD Dan Mackta here

A collection of electronic music, kosmiche, new-age, ambient, synth-wave and the earliest pioneers of what would go on to become synth-pop.  Ice Diving is a somewhat spectral and wintry playlist. The opener, Roger Limb’s seasonal adaptation of “‘Noel’ with synths”, originally used as the theme to the BBC’s serialisation of the classic children’s novel A Box Of Delights in 1984, captures that moment in time when new technology morphed with magic and the supernatural, later inspiring the “retro-futurist” movement, and much else besides. And indeed, as this collection progresses through Japanese neo-classicist Isao Tomita into late ’70s and ’80s synth-based library music, a strong German element, into the industrial emblems and cold war paranoia of the emerging Brit school, this is a chilly, stark, but somewhat calming set of songs where mood and atmosphere, tone and build coalesce around themes of space exploration and cold polar winds.

Put on the winter coat and take a long stroll.

© Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills /Shindig! magazine in partnership with Qobuz