ANTS Podcast

The official podcast of AiMT. Mixes by Baby Armie and occasional guests. • About ANTS Podcast • Subscribe on iTunes • Subscribe via RSS • Follow on SoundCloud • Follow on Mixcloud • Baby Armie on Twitter • Booking contact

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Gentle Daps XXVI: Speed Zen

I tend to spend a very long time researching for and compiling Gentle Daps mixes, so I decided to challenge myself to compile, record, and publish a mix all in one sitting. This gave me an opportunity to revisit some favorites and not get too caught up in the discovery process. It was oddly satisfying to breeze through this and reach right for the good stuff.

The result of this experiment is—surprise!—a pretty straightforward ambient and new age playlist. (Nothing wrong with that though, right?)

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ANNOUNCEMENT: Music to Send Nudes By has moved to its own podcast

https://mtsnb.tumblr.com

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Gentle Daps XXV: Guest Mix by Deejay Greenman

English soft rock aficionado Deejay Greenman has returned with his sequel to last month's Write Your Lucky Number (Gentle Daps XXIV). He picks up where he left of and offers up another hour of rare '70s-centric soft rock of the supremely hushed, mellow variety. These two mixes are treasures, and I am thrilled they are part of the Gentle Daps canon.

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Gentle Daps XXIV: Guest Mix by Deejay Greenman

Brighton-based Deejay Greenman caught my ear a few months ago with his excellent Mixcloud series of smooth AOR. I knew his knack for picking out wonderfully soft adult rock from the '60s, '70s, and '80s would make him a great fit for Gentle Daps. Lucky for us, he heard my call and put together this enchanting entry to the series. He's calling it Write Your Lucky Number.

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Gentle Daps XXIII: DAPS DYNASTY 3 — 2-Hour Anniversary Special

Celebrating three years of Gentle Daps.

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Gentle Daps XXII: Guest Mix by Sunmoonstar

Gainesville, Florida-based producer Natasha Home (aka Sunmoonstar) has been on the Gentle Daps radar since wowing us with a pair of great albums in 2015. Now she has offered up her own entry in the series by blessing us with 93 minutes of ambient and new age splashed with a few bright peaks of experimental pop and classical.

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Gentle Daps XXI: Halloween Special

This years' Gentle Daps Halloween special features dreary, quiet obscuro, goth, and film scores. It includes a couple of creepy crawly Legowelt classics, a spooky Bowie cover, a few first-wave 4AD ethereal pieces, and much more.

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Armchair Backlog, 2016 Q2

Baby Armie turns the page on another quarter in chill music findings.

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Gentle Daps XX: Calming Music Recorded for Children and Babies

Baby Armie explores vintage synth-driven children's music for Gentle Daps' 20th episode.

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Armchair Backlog, 2016 Q1

The first quarter's best offerings in subdued music.

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Gentle Daps XIX: DAPS DYNASTY 2 — Anniversary Special

Gentle Daps returns to its roots in soft pop, soft prog, ethereal, and fusion with this two-year anniversary episode mixed by yours truly.

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Armchair Backlog, 2015 Q4

Baby Armie looks back at his favorite findings in the realm of late 2015 chill music.

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Gentle Daps XVIII: Guest Mix by Opaline

Portland-based ambient artist Opaline has gotten regular coverage here on AiMT, so I am thrilled that he's been kind enough to offer up this latest entry in the Gentle Daps series. It's a live mix made up entirely of vinyl and cassettes, and it continues the new age theme of the past few Daps episodes. The format choice is fitting considering Opaline's thick release schedule of cassettes in recent years. His most recent is called Open Source and is available on Hacktivism Records. Stream/buy it and the rest of Opaline's extensively serene catalog over on his Bandcamp page.

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Gentle Daps XVII: New Age in 2015 — Cassette Roundup

It's time once again to examine the state of the revival of new age music. This episode of Gentle Daps focuses on this year's standout new age cassette releases.

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Armchair Backlog, 2015 Q3

A spotlight on some of the third quarter's best subdued musical offerings.

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#034: 1080p Spotlight

Vancouver-based tape label 1080p has been one of the most covered if not THE most covered label on AiMT over the past couple of years, so it's only right that I give it a proper spotlight in the form of this 50-minute mixed tribute sampler, which features all dance and experimental material from the label's 2015 catalog.

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#033.5: Mike & Rich — Beatless Ambient Demos

I can still very vividly recall the first time I heard ambient music. It was during my teenage years. I popped in the record store at our local mall—a Sam Goody or something like that—and picked up Selected Ambient Works, Vol. II by Aphex Twin. I had read about ambient but had never actually heard it. I remember being very surprised and delighted to find this album at such a small shop in our relatively small town. (Mind you, this was in the mid '90s, so music consumption via the internet wasn't really a thing except for the tech elite.) I wandered back to the car, popped in the CD, and was absolutely mesmerized and transplanted by what I heard. The dark, eerie vibes of SAW2 aren't exactly the ideal introduction to the genre, but I managed to gulp it all down without any trouble. From that moment forward, I knew this music would be a passion of mine. And fittingly, the SAW duology is some of the most celebrated and sought after material in Richard D. James' (aka Aphex Twin's) catalog. However his ambient work at large is scarce in comparison to his vastly more plentiful beat-centric material. When James shocked the electronic music world earlier this year by leaking 175 previously unreleased and unheard early demos on SoundCloud, it was no big surprise that ambient music made up a tiny fraction of the flood. Not that I'm complaining—this clutch of tracks is an absolute treasure—but I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't hoping for more SAW2-style ambient out of the whole ordeal. After all that's the era of his career that shaped me the most. I've noticed that many of the fan mixes dedicated to the flood—both simple SoundCloud sets and intricate DJ sets alike—seem to favor James' SAW1-era ambient techno tracks over the beatless tracks more akin to SAW2. (Even James put together a SoundCloud playlist entitled SAW 1.5, which is all techno.) But since I'm clearly biased toward his beatless efforts, those were my focus for this podcast. Luckily James' friend and collaborator Mike Paradinas (aka µ-Ziq) followed James' lead and leaked 156 of his own demos, which include a few beatless numbers. The combined beatless efforts of the two producers exceeds an hour, and it makes for good album-style listening. This may be the closest thing we'll ever get to another SAW2-style album out of RDJ, so let's savor these selections.