Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Ocean of Sound begins in 1889 at the Paris Exposition when Debussy first heard Javanese music performed. A culture absorbed in perfume, light and ambient sound developed in response to the intangibility of 20th century communications. David Toop traces the evolution of this culture, through Erik Satie to the Velvet Undergound; Miles Davis to Jimi Hendrix.

David Toop , who lives in London, is a writer, musician and recording artist. His other books are Rap Attack 3 and Exotica .

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Booklist Review

Ethereal, ambient sound is a passion in certain circles in England and the U.S. Toop traces the twentieth-century history of music that "could be characterised [sic] as drifting or simply existing in stasis rather than developing in any dramatic fashion." For Toop, the lineage of such music includes Javanese pulsation, the recording-studio-as-instrument excursions of Jamaican dub pioneer Lee "Scratch" Perry and Beach Boy Brian Wilson, John Cage's Zen composition theories, and a plethora of jazz players, most notably Sun Ra and Miles Davis. Toop argues that these disparate influences are incorporated in the work of such contemporary "techno" musicians and DJs as Aphex Twin and the Orb. Toop does not use recordings as his only references but, like the wandering music he describes, touches on science fiction, semiotic theory, and his own travels in this expansive treatise. He incorporates all these subjects into a clear and direct book that may appeal even to readers whose listening preferences are more conventional. --Aaron Cohen