Hi, I'm looking for some instrumental albums that are some of the best stuff you have ever heard and you listen to a lot. It can be Beautiful, Epic, Dark, Dreamy-Trance-like... Anything as long as it is memorable in some way and you recognize it easily, and of course instrumental.

Any genre from old 70's stuff to more modern.

Only stuff YOU sincerely enjoy and listen to frequently, do not mention stuff just to mention something.

Thanks!

drudkh - songs of grief and solitude.

listen to it a fair bit, a really nice album.

The Exivious album has a fairly good rotation here, being that it's the best album Cynic never released!

Besides the song "Melting", Dopamine's "Dying Away in the Deep Fall" is a great instrumental release. I say that about "Melting" because it has vocals, but it's also my favorite song on the album, so...

Damn, beat me to the punch.

Agalloch's The White is almost entirely instrumental and it is amazing. Its folk and ambient done extremely well. Hex by Earth is really good too, kind of like drone music set in the old west.

Everyone will hate me for this but ... I adore Behold... the Arctopus Skullgrid as well as Blotted Science Machinations of Dementia. Also they're is a lot of BucketHeads discography I swear by as well. I suppose some audio examples wouldn't hurt would they?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4OrOdgt7nc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRYpsCsjnXk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0nEkkpShsg

"Ommadawn" by Mike Oldfield (1975), my alltime favourite album, largely instrumental barring some chanted vocal textures and a brief acoustic song tagged on the end. A beautiful album of shifting moods and subtly recurring themes, mixing folk and world influences into a "progressive rock" structure. At 37 minutes, it's a fairly short album, but it takes me on an epic journey every time I listen to it.

His next album "Incantations" (1977) is awesome too; a lengthier work that brings a more symphonic sound heavily borrowing from "minimalist" composers like Glass etc. Again, there are a couple of vocal sections (featuring Maddy Prior from Steeleye Span), but it is largely instrumental.

Another one that I discovered recently, but has become a firm favourite; "Pyramid Of The Sun" by Maserati. It's totally instrumental, a driving trance-like hybrid of space-rock, krautrock and post-rock, based around rhythmically delayed spacey guitar and synth lines. Bloody fantastic, in my opinion.

Any album by Pelican my personal favourite is Australasia.

Blotted Science are pretty well-received around here. Anyway, I'll second them. You may want to check out their recent EP "The Animation of Entomology" first, it's a bit more accessible than the debut, partly due to the shorter running time.

Thanks... I'll check out the Mike Oldfield albums (only heard the album with "The Exorcist"-song) and Dopamine. the rest of the stuff you guys recommended I'm already familiar with. I really don't like Blotted Science, so please don't recommend anything similar! Thanks again

If you dig Dopamine (which you should), do check out the main songwriter's new project, Lostime. He's released only 2 songs before calling it quits (again...), but they're more of the same great post-black stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwBxO2I-CNk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrjRUYfMDxI

Not sure how you'd acquire physical copies of the demos, but downloads were rather easy to find.

so, what about ambient/electronic music?






Carbon Based Lifeforms - World Of Sleepers (2006)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_8G0zHMuwg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU5hlK0Y6VA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7cpS2DDB_E


one of the best ambient album. EVER.

apocalyptica - inquisition symphony

i thought the "plays metallica by four cellos" was rather sloppy (not to mention a horrible name for an album), and i haven't bothered with the band since they got drums, but that one album was bloody brilliant

also, blotted science is something that takes quite a few spins before you start to appreciate it; i'd recommend giving it some time to sink in before dismissing it

I should!? Haha, what a statement.

The Dopamine album was pretty good, but the vocals ruined it. I don't get why anyone would want to ruin the music with shitty vocals. Lostime was better production-wise. I'll defiantly listen to some more, probably skip the vocal-tracks on dopamine. Not extremely memorable at once, but it might build on me. Thanks.

There's only one track with vocals. The rest are instrumental.

No there are 2. Both the third and fifth track!

I really enjoy listening to both of the albums by Animals as Leaders.

Lol those are the same track, just with different production.

There's some really interesting reccomendations in here but I've always found this to be Drudkh's most utterly boring album. I think I'd go so far as to say it's the most boring album I've ever heard. I can't sit through it.

God Is An Astronaut - All Is Violent, All Is Bright (2005)

streaming here
http://grooveshark.com/#!/album/All+Is+ ... ht/1383033


you can also try some post rock with beautiful melodies and stunning crescendos

Sleep Terror's Probing Tranquility is my favorite instrumental album. It's filled with amazing jaw dropping riffs and there's quite a bit of jazz influence thrown in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6cBchGsUuQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8u7PD8q1w4

I didn't realize that on the first listen, but that doesn't change the fact that there are 2 vocal tracks!

Pelican- City of Echoes
Earth- Bees Made Honey in the Lion's Skull

Thanks, but I've heard both before. But I don't remember the Pelican release so I'll check it out again!

Humanoid's Remembering Universe maybe? Progressive instrumental band from Canada. Contains members from Unexpect and Augury.

Nachtreich is pretty amazing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5gqecQLg9E

I have no recs to add, but I have to say, this is great thread

Try Alejandro Silva Power Cuarteto. Lots of guitar instrumental.

Seconding All Is Violent, All Is Bright by God Is An Astronaut. In fact go with the whole discography. You can't do wrong with GIAA. For instrumental music post-rock is your genre. If you want metal check out Omega Massif

I would suggest you Bongripper's "Satan Worshipping Doom" if you're into sludge and swampy dark music. I haven't heard a lot of instrumental albums, but that's one that made a great impression on me.

Here's one of the songs: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drzzGClaEKU

Terminal Sound System - Heavy Weather (2011)

post rock/metal, industrial rock, future jazz, dubstep: dense, dreamy, deeeeeep
streaming here:
http://store.terminalsoundsystem.com/al ... vy-weather

Christian Muenzner's solo album, 2011. Some of it is Neoclassical Shred, some of it is melodic death metal, some of it just instrumental ballad metal. It's really good.

Evan Brewer's "all-bass" album 2011.
Francesco Artuso Project album 2011.

Michael Hedges- Aerial Boundaries
Andy Mckee- Art of Motion

These two are beautiful acoustic instrumental albums. Mckee is very melodic and Hedges is very out there. Both very much worth checking out.

Pat Metheny- Secret Story

This album is something else. I don't feel like words can do it justice. It's all over the place. He is a jazz guitarist but this isn't really consistent with his output. He has always been really innovative, but this has a lot of non-American influence.

Scale the Summit- The Collective

American prog rock band from Texas. Extremely melodic. I feel as though they don't get a fair shake because they sometimes tour with these "djent" bands. They are nothing like that. Check em out.

Shawn Lane- Powers of Ten

Fusion stuff, but really melodic as well. A lot is made of his tremendous speed, but he uses that sparingly. Really good songwriting. Worth noting that it is out of print and not on iTunes, so you will have to download it.

Jason Becker,perpetual burn. Best shred album ever.

For some awesome stoner rock jamming you might wanna checkout Karma To Burn, Earthless and Monkey3.

Thanks guys... Trying to go through most of the recs!




Thanks this was badass!

Every Muslimgauze album meets the requisites of this thread. Not to mention millions of electronic music albums and mixes...

ill second this one,totally awesome album


also i recomend Mindflowers it will blow you away

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5X1d7XHuM0


finally this is maybe one of the most impressive albums i ever heard
Anomaly by Anomaly


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwAbC1XW ... plpp_video