Iconography, by Bill Nelson

Iconography

by Bill Nelson

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awrc I’ve always loved the two Orchestra Arcana albums - looped, spliced and assembled found voices from film, news and TV, served on a soothing bed of electronics with some understated guitar. It’s got a curiously timeless quality - it hasn’t aged, but even when I first heard it in 1989 it sounded temporally out-of-kilter, like having a radio where the tuner changed the year *and* the channel. Favorite track: News From Nowhere.

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	1.	Christ Via Wires 03:06
	2.	Clock Conscious 04:23
	3.	I Wonder 02:17
	4.	Eastern Electric 03:25
	5.	Search And Listen 02:10
	6.	News From Nowhere 02:39
	7.	One Man's Fetish Is Another Man's Faith 04:59
	8.	Right, Then Left 03:33
	9.	Iconography 02:15
	10.	The God's Speak 02:20
	11.	Life Class 02:52
	12.	Alter Natives 05:29
	13.	Sex, Psyche Etcetera 05:38
	14.	Several Famous Orchestra 03:22
	15.	Who He Is 03:10
	16.	Slumbertime (Part One) 01:33
	17.	Are Quite Extraordinary 01:23
	18.	Yes-Yes 03:10
	19.	Perverse 01:38
	20.	Search And Listen (Part Two) 02:27
	21.	Absolutely Precise Meaning 01:33
	22.	Slumbertime (Part Two) 03:07

about

First released on vinyl in 1986, Iconography was the first album released under the Orchestra Arcana name, and was distinctive for the imaginative use of 'found voices' taken from various radio, TV and film sources.
The album appeared on CD for American audiences in 1989, but wasn't officially available on CD in the UK until the release of the double CD 'The Hermetic Jukebox' in 2002.
This extended digital download version includes seven extra previously unreleased tracks that were recorded during the same period.

"In 1984 I began a series of recordings, at my eight-track and tape-based home studio, which Iwould eventually release under the pseudonym of ‘Orchestra Arcana’ on my own Cocteau Records label. The first of these recordings in the form of a 12” EP released in 1985 and titled ‘Sex, Psyche, Etcetera’. This was followed by two full-length albums under the ‘Orchestra Arcana’ name. The first (in 1986) called ‘Iconography’ and the second, the following year called ‘Optimism’.
Whilst they reflect the extremely basic ‘lo-fi’ nature of my home studio at that time, I have always been fond of them. The recordings made use of ‘found’ sounds and voice samples without the aid of today's digital sampling equipment, relying on ingenuity, rather than technology.
Tape loops were employed, plus physical tape editing, trapped delays, memo-recorders and so on, to achieve these ends. Despite such restrictions, the processes seemed to be more immediate in effect and much quicker in execution than the digital/computer manipulations of modern studio technology. I think of it as a more intimate way of handling one’s sonic base materials, a way that involves getting one's hands dirty, rather than manipulating the material at a clinical, digital distance…as if it were some radioactive isotope on the other side of a glass screen.
Of course, like nearly everyone else, my home studio is now an almost exclusively digital domain. There are times however, when I miss the old analogue, tape-based approach. These recordings serve as a reminder to me that expensive technology isn't always the key to creativity…"

Bill Nelson - September 2002
(Extract taken from the Orchestra Arcana 2CD collection ‘The Hermetic Jukebox’)

This download comes complete with album artwork as PDF files.

For further information, please visit the discography on Dreamsville: www.billnelson.com/iconography

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released March 6, 2026

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Bill Nelson

Founder of Be-Bop Deluxe in 1973, guitarist Bill Nelson wrote all of the bands material. Signed to EMI, the band released five studio albums and scored a top ten UK hit with the single "Ships In The Night."
In 1979 Bill disbanded Be-Bop Deluxe and launched Red Noise.
As a solo artist he's worked with David Sylvian, Harold Budd and Cabaret Voltaire as well as producing The Skids and Gary Numan. ... more

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Iconography

by Bill Nelson

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