February 2013
Exai is now available to download from Warp Records ahead of schedule in high quality digital audio formats. The 4XLP & 2XCD packages will ship for March 4th/5th, with instant download immediately from today via the Autechre website.
Foals
Holy Fire is the third album from Oxford five-piece Foals, following 2010’s Total Life Forever. Recorded in London and produced by duo Flood and Alan Moulder, Holy Fire includes the single Inhaler, which builds from a tropical bounce into a thunderous, heavy chorus, typifying the experimental nature of the record.
Muslimgauze
Satyajit Eye is the more intriguing of two Bryn Jones reissues released this week. Muslimgauze archive series volume eleven. Edition of 500. We’re instantly entranced by the flurried percussions and raga drones and privy to some very special gear in the ritualistic electro-acoustic space shaping, a vibe which seeps into the stunningly spacious atmosphere and metal-tipped polyrhythms of ‘Tuareg’. The title track manifests a lush ecology of raga drone and acousmatic field recordings precipitating more incredibly clear and precise drum work on ‘Dhobi’ and the evocatibely near psychedelic swirl of ‘Caste’.
The Knife
Full of Fire brings The Knife back with their first proper material since 2006. We’re only privy to one track for now, but the agitated electro weapon ‘Full Of Fire’ is (what sounds like) putting a machine drum thru its paces below chrome-bubbling melodic dissonance and possessed vocals from Karin Dreijer.
Four Tet
0181 serves as a reminder of the cyclic nature of this kind of instrumental production. Creating the electronic music of the future involves sifting through the past to re-discover sounds. 0181 bring to mind this sort of time-shift not because the sounds within are regressive, but rather because despite their 12-16 years of being hidden away, they feel surprisingly fresh. Made public as one long 38-minute track, 0181 has the flow of a mixtape, a wide-ranging showcase for Hebden’s early production flair. Unconnected in any real way beyond their sequencing are hushed melodic interludes, moments of ambient static, jazzy constructions, and the naked bones of early 2-step.
Actress
Silver Cloud is a 3-track affair released by Werkdiscs/Ninja Tune. Sidestepping from the sharper styles of ‘R.I.P.’ into muggier, rugged beat dimensions. Voodoo Posse Chronic Illusion is a scratchy, wriggly swinger swarming with offset bass bumps and wooden drums, prickly cloud of digital piff gas, harp hooks and a spectral vocal snippet all unfolding with that run-of-consciousness arrangement that only comes about at 4am when you’re operating on fumes, coffee and salty snax. Floating in Ecstasy is all about that crooked darkside lean, rounding up one crushed south London bass/trap killah and sounding like an abstract road-rap or grime instrumental for a zombie Chronik, beside a smoked-out slow/fast sci-fi trip titled Silver Cloud Dream Come True. Plug in, spark off, zone out business.
