New Age music is everywhere, if you know where to look.

We’ve explored the depths of RateYourMusic, and the outer reaches of the Jamendo Music archive. But all New Age pilgrims know that the best visionary music is found “in the wild”.

This is a roundup of some of the New Age albums I’ve found by chance while out and about – usually in charity shops.

It’s common to find albums by Enya and Enigma in second hand shops. But if you’re lucky, you’ll find something more unusual – something you probably would never have encountered by any other means.

We’re not talking about those omnipresent Pan Pipe Tribute to the Beatles albums. Who buys those, and why? Even I have my standards. Though I regret not buying one I recently found called Ocean Tchaikovsky – the composer’s melodies set to ocean waves. What might have been.

I was going to call this series – for it will be a series – Car Boot New Age, as a tribute to Nightmares on Wax. But I am yet to find any New Age music at a car boot sale. One day. One day.

Danny Becher – Tibetan Singing Bowls (2001)

I got this one from a charity shop somewhere in Liverpool. I thought it would be peaceful, relaxing, and meditative, and it is. But little did I know that, in buying a second hand New Age CD for 50p, I was in fact opening a direct line of communication with those inscrutable centipedes that run the universe.

Danny churns and strikes his bowls to make mysterious chimes and drones. He describes his work as “sound awareness”, and “poetry without words”. He also practices cymatics – the study of the patterns produced by vibrating bodies. He’s interested in making sound visible: “What you see, is what you hear.”

Danny wants to make it clear that his Tibetan Singing Bowls album is not to be treated as background music. The liner notes specifically instruct you to file it under “practical music”.

“This recording aims to create a balancing and harmonising effect between the left and right side of the brain,” he writes.

“Some bowls are also used that correspond to the frequencies of planets.

“Pulsating sounds between the right and left bowls create a vibrational pattern. This pattern can tune brainwaves into alpha and theta states. By listening to overtones you experience improved concentration, articulation and hearing.

“You could say that we are listening into another dimension, a dimension that is always there but we are usually unaware of.”

Do you hear the centipedes shaking their sixteen heads at your delirium?

Scott Fitzgerald & M.B. Gordy – All One Tribe (1993)

This one came from a charity shop somewhere in the East Midlands. My copy has that nice earthy cover above. It’s good, and would look great as a t-shirt. But I wish I’d found a copy with this alternative cover:

Look how much fun they’re having!

This album is “the long awaited sequel to the immensely popular Thunderdrums.” I have never heard Thunderdrums. The AllMusic review describes it as “neo-shamanic dynamic ambience intended to explode the mind, move the body, and fire the soul.”

For Thunderdrums II, Scott Fitzgerald (who was a jazz age novelist before he became a new age shamen) is joined by M.B Gordy, a percussionist who has worked with both The Doobie Brothers and Green Day. From the sublime to the ridiculous, hey?

Apparently, the original Thunderdrums focused on Native American and African sounds. The sequel casts it net much wider. It is “a global journey from North America to South America, the Caribbean, Australia, the Middle East and China for a highly melodic and modern interpretation of ancient tribal cultures.”

MB Gordy plays a variety of percussion instruments, one of which is referred to as a “big hairy drum”. Scott Fitzgerald takes care of the rest – keyboards, midi sequencing, bamboo flutes, and so on.

It’s all highly melodic and, if you like this sort of thing, very uplifting. It’s the sort of music I imagine they used to play in the Rainforest Café. I particularly like My Island, a totally tropical sunshine jam with steel drums. And if you’ve ever eaten at Ichiran Ramen, then Original Memory will remind you of the polyrhythms they play on a loop while you wait for your booth.

You might feel the need to scream at Scott: Stay in your lane! How DARE you play the music of cultures that are not your own!

But Scott knew you’d say that. He’s got your number:

“All One Tribe does not attempt to accurately represent different cultures and their music. It will be ‘musically incorrect’ for those musicologists seeking proper ethnic instrumentation and rhythm. Conversely, the music stems from a deep memory.

“Modern science teaches us that matter, including the atoms, molecules and cells that constitute our bodies as we know them, consists of vibratory rates, and simply reforms again and again, supporting the concept that we all may have, at one time, been a part of everything we see and feel around us, as well as those things we do not…

“As I attempted to write each composition, a powerful and haunting “original memory” surfaced almost as if I had one time been part of each culture represented by the music. … It is my belief that, on some level, we are all one people.”

Scott was part of these tribes, and so were you. So there!

Global Journey – Dolphin Paradise (2018)

If you’re of a certain age, you might remember a time when New Age listening posts could be found in service stations and theme park gift shops across the land.

They were beautiful things. A big wooden frame with in-built speakers and an array of glowing buttons, each showing a different environment: Rainforests, deserts, rivers, oceans. You’d press a button, hear a beep, and then a woman would gently announce your selection: “Forest Rain“. You’d then get a short sample of the recording. The staff must have loved it.

I never bought any CDs from these listening posts. I was too young, and now these wonderful New Age listening posts are gone for good. But in a garden centre halfway between Derby and Nottingham, up until very recently there was a Global Journey display.

(What’s Global Journey? We’ll get to that.)

This display wasn’t as luxurious as those New Age listening posts of yore – it was made of decaying blue cardboard instead of wood – but it was still possible to play samples from the range.

The management put this display in the same room where the cats like to hang out. So you could spend as long as you wanted just chilling with the cats, the plants, and the New Age music. The display is gone now. But the cats abide.

I have four Global Journey CDs. They were in fact the first CDs I bought “in the wild” when we were finally allowed to leave the house again following the recent hideous years.

I won’t cover each one in detail, as they all offer vaguely the same experience: Peaceful acoustic music augmented by gentle synths, interspersed with sounds from this crazy little planet we call Earth – whales, dolphins, waves, chanting, and so on.

Let’s focus on Dolphin Paradise, as for some reason, the dolphin is the quintessential new age creature.

“The freedom and grandeur of one of nature’s most enchanting creatures and their habitat come alive in this collection of elegant original compositions … The result is soothing arrangements, imaginative instrumentation and exquisite melodies that take you on a journey to this mysterious underwater Dolphin Paradise.”

It features guitar, piano, oboe, violin, bass, synths, and the sounds of not just dolphins, but also humpback whales and seagulls! You get lots of ocean sounds too, and song titles like Aquatic Poetry, Dolphin Dreams, and Arc of the Dolphin.

There is no mention of any musicians anywhere. But according to the Global Journey website, “our high quality music is composed and performed by leading professional musicians and artists who have worked for many of our mainstream recording stars, International Orchestras and for Film and TV.”

This is stiflingly pleasant musical morphine. Put it on and forget about it, but enjoy a mild feeling of calm goodwill, and a glistening affinity with dolphinkind. If I could swallow this CD and absorb its lessons, I would never worry about anything ever again. My shoulders would be like liquid.

Yet there’s something fishy going on here.

And that wasn’t a pun, as dolphins are mammals, just like you and me.

First, I noticed this message in the liner notes: “If you appreciate sound quality then congratulations on buying this Compact Disc, the ultimate way to buy audio … This CD will outline [sic] your hard disk drive, music player and mobile phone so is the best storage medium for your collection.”

What an odd thing to say.

Curious, I headed to the Global Journey Audio website, which describes itself as “your one stop shop for your audio entertainment”.

Their range of CDs includes the Music 4 Me series for children. These CDs feature songs and stories, with your child’s name repeated endlessly. “Children’s faces will light up when they hear their name repeated throughout.”

“Global Journey Music and Audio CDs offer the very best selling and most comprehensive selection of original CDs Worldwide,” we’re told.

Some of their releases even have buyer reviews. For example, let’s take a look at what satisfied customers had to say about Zen Garden World Music.

Jan from Alton says: “The wonderful relaxing music takes one to a place far away from every day stress. It also helps if played when doing a job one loathes. There is nothing to dislike.”

Judith from Dorset says: “My most played CD. This CD has been a lifeline to me. More than any other I own, it has helped me cope with stress and become a true friend.”

Is any of this real?

The liner notes to the Chill Out Mantras CD mention how the music can “play an important role in the fight against: Depression, Stress, High Blood Pressure, Insomnia and Negativity … impressive enough BUT by doing this there is much evidence that this can also help in the treatment of more serious illnesses such as Cancer, Strokes and Heart Attacks.”

It’s nice music, but I sincerely doubt it has quite the healing qualities they’re claiming it has.

The garbled grammar, the grandiose claims, the reviews from people who may not exist – it’s all so uncanny. I’d have suspected the involvement of AI, but some of these CDs were released as far back as 2003.

Aliens. I’m saying it’s aliens. Aliens did not build the pyramids, but they did record and release these relaxing CDs. That much is obvious.

Prepare accordingly.