"(No Pussyfooting)" is the debut studio album by the British duo Fripp & Eno, released in 1973. It marked the beginning of their influential collaboration, blending Brian Eno's tape-delay looping experiments with Robert Fripp's "Frippertronics" electric guitar technique. The album was recorded in three sessions over the span of a year and is considered one of Eno's early ventures into ambient music. Its release came just before Eno's solo debut Here Come the Warm Jets in 1974.
The production process began in September 1972 when Eno invited Fripp to his London home studio. Eno was experimenting with a tape-delay feedback system, which he had developed while studying at the Winchester School of Art. This system, which he called the "Time-Lag Accumulator," involved using two reel-to-reel tape recorders in tandem. Sounds recorded on the first deck would be played back on the second, which would then loop the sound back into the first, creating a long, evolving delay. This technique was influenced by similar experiments by Terry Riley and an anonymous engineer in Paris in the early 1960s. Over Eno's loops, Fripp played guitar, sometimes looping it and sometimes allowing Eno to record his guitar without looping. The result was a dense, atmospheric, and multi-layered sound, laying the groundwork for ambient music.
The album consists of two tracks. The first, "The Heavenly Music Corporation," occupies the entire first side and runs for 21 minutes. It was recorded in two takes: the first establishing the background looping track, and the second featuring an extended guitar solo by Fripp over the looped background. The track features Fripp's electric guitar as the sole sound source, creating a meditative, flowing atmosphere. Originally, Fripp wanted to title the track "The Transcendental Music Corporation," but Eno vetoed the idea, fearing it might sound too pretentious.
The second track, "Swastika Girls," fills the other side of the album and was recorded almost a year later, in August 1973, at Command Studios in London. This track used a similar technique, but this time Fripp played guitar to a background electronic loop created by Eno on the VCS3 synthesizer. The final mixing and assembly of the track were completed at George Martin's AIR Studios, where the duo worked closely with Martin. The track’s title came from a provocative image Eno had found—a photo of nude women performing a Nazi salute, taken from a discarded pornographic film magazine. Eno pasted the image on the recording console while the track was being recorded, and the title stuck.
(No Pussyfooting) became an early and important work in the ambient music genre, showcasing the experimental techniques that would later influence much of Eno’s career and the development of ambient soundscapes.
