Jack Anderton

Jack Anderton is a music producer born on July 29th 1986 in Scunthorpe, United Kingdom. He creates music derived from a wide range of influences including ambient, shoegaze, electronic and choral. His latest album, The Moment is a clean sounding ambient electronic music album taking in elements from various eras of ambient music. This artist is recently releasing two archive compilations through the netlabel Jerky Oats Records. http://www.secondthought.co.uk/jerkyoats/releases.htm


Jack Anderton’s 2005 debut release Mushroom Clouds is a dark sparse work using low grainy synth and keyboard melodies often with an acoustic rhythm, acoustic melody and choral vocals. The production of the album is generally lo-fi with an emphasis on the human aspect of ambient music.

Jack Anderton was interested in developing music from an early age, writing lyrics before laying hands on a musical instrument, until he first up a guitar at the age of 11. With improvements in digital music production between 95-00, Jack Anderton began learning the basics of how to assemble sounds and record sounds in 2000, working collaboratively with his brother on a number of basic electronic loops. These were developed to a point but with no spark or means to create truly original music- this stalled, until 2003 when an early attempt to combine electronic music with acoustic guitar was done. Heavily experimental and too rough to release, this also proved to be a false start. As Jack Anderton moved to university, the opportunities for late-night noodling and experimentation came back. Directly inspired by Phaedra, the seminal Tangerine Dream ambient work, the track Relapse was produced and that was the spark for everything that followed, most immediately being the debut release Mushroom Clouds.


This was followed by a second 2005 release Lucid Dreams which expanded on the original project into experimental, psychedelic areas with a brighter guitar sound and a wider background pallette. Samples from early morning tv shows and childrens television with a mix of soft eclectic keys and vocals create a consistent sound that lies somewhere inbetween melancholy and bliss. The third of 2005’s ‘ambient acoustic’ releases in the autumn Slow Motion was a refinement of the technique with a more natural sound.

In 2006 the release of the album Frequency heralded a departure from the acoustic sound and into electronic music as the core sound of the album. The sound mixes in jaunty and odd cultural elements in a similar fashion to Lucid Dreams but the production is generally more derivative. The combination of the two styles was brought to better effect on 2006’s second release Tomb Under The Moon where heavily filtered synth and shuffling percussion worked well with the dulled bass and guitar melody. The resulting cold tones gives it a greater sense of identity and a cohesion of ideas.

The end of 2006 was a heavily creative period, building on the growing success of the sound, and the end products were significant enough to release Wheels Of Industry in the New Year of 2007, a 2CD album, and a mini-album The Autumn Collection later on in the year, comprised of session tracks that were unsuited or simply could not fit onto the project. Wheels Of Industry is a large 15 track album of ambient electronic music with post-rock and progressive-rock influences with markedly more accomplished production.

2008’s releases Another False Escape and Graceland are both attempts to develop upon the post-rock and shoegaze influences, and contain fewer ambient works. There are mixed results and with the redevelopment of the guitar based songs, a few callbacks to the ambient acoustic releases.

2009’s release Spires; Echoes: Seduction is a more exploratory release, which is synth and beat led with minimalist techno influences with ambient city and industry sounds. The album features greatly improved production.

On New Year’s Day 2010 the new Jack Anderton album The Moment was released consolidating on the electronic theme with improved production and a wider more carefully selected range of samples and noises.

In July 2010 2 archive albums were released on netlabel Jerky Oats. Archive I - Ambient Acoustic showcased the best work with acoustic ambience while Archive II - Electronic charted the shift of styles, towards more beat driven electronic sounds.