On 23 August, almost forty years after it was initially released, The Moon and the Melodies by Cocteau Twins and Harold Budd is being reissued on vinyl for the first time remastered, from the original tapes, by Robin Guthrie himself.

The Moon and the Melodies is a singular record within the Cocteau Twins’ catalogue unusually ethereal, even by their standards, and largely instrumental, guided by the free form improvisations of Harold Budd, an ambient pioneer who had drifted into their orbit as if by divine intervention. Building on the atmospheric bliss of Victorialand, released earlier the same year, it signalled a possible future for the trio, yet it was a path they’d never take again.