I am bathing in I Believe in You from Talk Talk's splendid Spirit of Eden right now. This thread on ILM brought this album back to my mind. And there is another looong and instructive thread on Talk Talk.

How to describe this celestial music? A blend of lots of soundtrack, some symphony, a little progrock, a wee bit of jazz improvisation, a lot of blues and a voice (Mark Hollis) which would have annoyed me ten years ago but which does meld just perfectly with the mostly sparse and understated arrangements with so many instruments.

There is not a lot happening in the music, it is not for short time-span attentionists. I have listened to it a couple of times yesterday and today. It is nice background wallpaper music but it is even better when you really listen to it, when you pay attention to what's going on. My favourite instruments besides Mark Hollis' voice are the distorted harmonica and the percussion and the bass and and and. Just every bloody instrument. And the breaks, the pauses just before the waves continue to roll. There are also these violent non-expected eruptions like in Desire which make this album a soundtrack of real life.

This is one of the albums you should listen to on headphones and smoke a joint to. Though this is a contradiction. Joints are made to connect to people and not to disconnect from the world.