The Orb formed in London in the late 1980s, with Alex Paterson at the center of a shifting group of collaborators. They were part of that moment when ambient textures began meeting the rhythms of the rave scene, and their 1991 debut album 'The Orb's Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld' helped define what people called ambient house.
Their track 'Little Fluffy Clouds' became the thing most people knew them by. It used a sample of Rickie Lee Jones talking about the Arizona sky, layering it over a drifting, hypnotic beat. The song had a way of sticking around, turning up in clubs and on home stereos long after its 1990 release.
The group's lineup changed over time, with Jimmy Cauty leaving in the early 1990s. Paterson kept the project going through various partnerships, exploring the spacious, sample-heavy sound they helped establish on other tracks like 'Ghostdancing' and 'Reaper Of The Orb'.
Keep it compact: a lyric you come back to, a live memory, or the part of the catalog you would point someone toward first.
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