Joshua Robert Hampson (born 10 June 1965) is an English

musician A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wri ...

and

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, known primarily as a guitarist in the band

Loop Loop or LOOP may refer to: Brands and enterprises * Loop (mobile), a Bulgarian virtual network operator and co-founder of Loop Live * Loop, clothing, a company founded by Carlos Vasquez in the 1990s and worn by Digable Planets * Loop Mobile, an ...

, which he co-founded in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

in 1985 with his then-girlfriend Becky "Bex" Stewart. Loop recorded three albums, the last of which, ''

A Gilded Eternity ''A Gilded Eternity'' is the third studio album by the rock band Loop. Released in 1990 on Situation Two, it was a commercial success, topping the UK Indie Charts (as their previous album ''Fade Out Fade out, Fade-out or Fadeout may refer to: ...

'' (1990), made the

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales and (from March 2015) audio streaming in the United Kingdom. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the Official Charts C ...

. Following the band's breakup, Hampson formed the experimental project

Main Main may refer to: Geography * Main River (disambiguation) **Most commonly the Main (river) in Germany * Main, Iran, a village in Fars Province *"Spanish Main", the Caribbean coasts of mainland Spanish territories in the 16th and 17th centuries ...

with Scott Dawson.

Music career

After Loop disbanded, Hampson formed the more experimental

with fellow Loop member Scott Dowson, releasing several albums and EPs on Beggars Banquet Records. Although a strong signature in the early material of Main, the

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

was slowly eroded from the stable sounds Hampson and Dowson produced, together with field recordings and other electro-acoustic sounds. When Dowson left the line-up in 1996, Main became a solo project for Hampson, who then abandoned the guitar altogether, feeling he had taken the instrument to such extremes that there was no longer any scope to create with it. Between 1999 and 2003, he formed the electroacoustic duo Comae with

Janek Schaefer Janek Schaefer (born 1970) is a British avant-garde artist, musician, composer, and entertainer, known for performing and exhibiting his work around the world with sound and installation art. Schaefer has released 36 albums, runs Lucky Dip Disco, ...

touring in Europe, US, Japan, and released their self titled album on Rhiz Records. He deactivated Main as a project in 2006, in an attempt to free himself of the restraints of critical and fan-based reviews, that still mentioned the guitar as the focal point of the material, even though he had not used it in many years. He was quoted in interviews as saying the guitar was a chain around his neck, and he was unhappy to be still so strongly associated with it. Preferring to now explore other avenues of sound and its diffusion, especially multichannel systems for live performances, Hampson was invited by the

Groupe de Recherches Musicales A group is a military unit or a military formation that is most often associated with military aviation. Air and aviation groups The terms group and wing differ significantly from one country to another, as well as between different branches ...

(GRM) in Paris to compose and perform on many occasions. He has also been associated with like-minded organisations and institutes around the world, exploring intricacies in sound composition. In 2010, Hampson announced that he would be reactivating Main, which along with his solo

acousmatic Acousmatic sound is sound that is heard without an originating cause being seen. The word ''acousmatic'', from the French ''acousmatique'', is derived from the Greek word ''akousmatikoi'' (ἀκουσματικοί), which referred to probationary p ...

work, he will start performing and recording as a more collaborative process with fellow sound artists. A planned Loop reunion (of the ''Gilded Eternity'' line-up) later followed, in a statement by Hampson in April 2013. Starting in 1996, Robert Hampson also seldomly released tracks and remixes (

Bowery Electric Bowery Electric was an American post-rock band, formed by Lawrence Chandler and Martha Schwendener in 1993. History Formed by Lawrence Chandler and Martha Schwendener in late 1993, Bowery Electric played their first show in New York City in Jan ...

Veronica Vasicka Veronica Vasicka (; born 1975) is a photographer, record label founder, radio and club DJ. She is the founder of Minimal Wave Records, a record label focused on obscure electronic music from the 1970s and 1980s, as well as its sub label Cititrax ...

, Eros) under the Chasm moniker.

Discography

on Editions Mego * ''Five Mountains of Fire / Antarctica Ends Here'' - Cindytalk / Robert Hampson 10-inch vinyl only, limited to 500 copies. * ''Répercussions'' (eMEGO 132) CD + 5.1 DVD * ''Signaux'' (eMEGO 148.1) * ''Suspended Cadences'' (eMEGO 148.2) * ''Ablation'' (as

with

Stephan Mathieu Stephan Mathieu (born 11 October 1967) is a German mastering engineer and former musician. He currently lives in Bonn, Germany where he runs ''Schwebung Mastering'', an independent studio for audio mastering and restoration. :“(In 1997), I wo ...

) (eMEGO 160) with

Godflesh Godflesh are an English industrial metal band from Birmingham. The group formed in 1982 under the title Fall of Because but did not release any complete music until 1988 when Justin Broadrick (guitar, vocals and programming) and G. C. Gree ...

* '' Cold World'' (1991) * ''

Pure Pure may refer to: Computing * A pure function * A pure virtual function * PureSystems, a family of computer systems introduced by IBM in 2012 * Pure Software, a company founded in 1991 by Reed Hastings to support the Purify tool * Pure-FTPd, ...

'' (1992) on Touch * ''Vectors'' - Robert Hampson CD on Rhiz * ''Comae'' - s/t CD 2001 on Reactor (Loop re-issues) * ''Heaven's End Fade Out: A Gilded Eternity'' – studio albums, remastered two-disc sets with extra material and Peel Sessions * ''The World in Your Eyes'' – three-disc set, compilation of singles, EPs and rarities

References

External links

RobertHampson.com (semi-official Robert Hampson website)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hampson, Robert English rock guitarists English male guitarists Living people Godflesh members 1965 births Musicians from the London Borough of Bromley People from Bromley