electronica
Barney Harsent
There used to be a time when albums would regularly come in at around the 45-minute mark. It was pretty much the perfect length for fitting on to one side of a C90 (disclaimer: Home Taping Is Killing Music) and made the most of the vinyl format’s sonic limitations. Now, with the endless digital stream imposing no such restrictions, Four Tet’s latest offering – two tracks spread over 40 minutes – feels almost like a novella by comparison. That’s fine though, I like novellas: good ones scale back the grand plan, trim the fat and focus on what’s important.The first of the tracks, “Morning”, Read more ...
Barney Harsent
I’m in a car and I’m uncomfortably hot. The reason I’m in a car is I’m on my way to a gig on the first day in 14 years that industrial action has brought London Underground to a standstill. No skeleton service, no contingency, just closed doors and solidarity. This means it’s bumper-to-bumper and I’m running late. Very late. I’m on my way to Abbey Road Studios where Studio Two has been opened up for a special performance by pianist and composer Tom Hodge and electronic producer Max Cooper. A team-up with the soon-to-be launched Sonos Studio in Shoreditch, it’s an evening with the focus Read more ...
joe.muggs
Here's a funny one: used as an adjective, “lifestyle” has lately become a popular pejorative term for music (see, most recently, the kerfuffle over Jamie xx's debut solo album). It's taken the place of “coffee table”, which was the Nineties phrase of choice to deride trip-hop and other styles that were considered too smooth or sedentary to meet required criteria of rebelliousness or authenticity or whatever.This tends, of course, to be a thin veil for inevitably middle-class commentators' neuroses and noble savage view of musicians – and it never involves any examination of who listens to the Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Peter Zinovieff: Electronic Calendar – The EMS TapesRoxy Music’s June 1972 debut appearance on The Old Grey Whistle Test found them miming to “Ladytron” from their debut album, released that week. A prime focus for the camera was Eno, in a fake leopard-skin jacket and shiny gold gloves. Twiddling knobs and waggling a joystick, he stood at what was obviously an instrument but not a conventional one. There was no keyboard and the noises generated bubbled and swooped. This was an EMS synthesiser.The EMS synthesiser was British and a favourite of Hawkwind, Pink Floyd, Paul McCartney, The Read more ...
Barney Harsent
Every 75 years or so, Halley’s Comet comes round to say, "Hi". When it does, there’s genuine excitement, not because there’s any kind of stock trade in fond reminiscence when it comes to glowing lumps of rock, but because it’s a genuinely captivating event. The Orb’s latest offering is similarly hurtling through space once more, and reminding us of their conceptual debut that slapped us around our collective face back in 1991. It feels like a similar event.The first thing to say is that this is, without doubt, the most coherent offering from the Orb (currently comprised of Alex Paterson and Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Giorgio Moroder has long been adopted by the cognoscenti. He’s the studio wizard who gave us key Seventies disco hits, iconic in the development of electronic music and club culture. The culmination of this archiving tendency was the tribute song on Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories, indeed, the whole album seemed sprinkled with shiny Moroder synth polish. It was undoubtedly this that resulted in Sony hauling him from retirement to work with a who’s who of contemporary chart-pop. The result is appalling, a catastrophic mire of Costa del Dumb Euro-cheese, pitched in some teeth-jarring Read more ...
Barney Harsent
When International Feel label boss Mark Barrott moved from Uruguay to Ibiza, it was surely only a matter of time before he hooked up with Café Del Mar’s legendary sunset soundtracker José Padilla – inevitable even. The choice of producers to work alongside Padilla on this, his fourth album, is far from predictable however – in fact it’s inspired. Alongside Padilla himself and Barrott are Henning Severud (Telephones), Jan Schulte (Wolf Müller) and Lewis Day (Tornado Wallace). Padilla is in good company here – a fact he has been keen to acknowledge himself.On first listen, this seems Read more ...
Barney Harsent
The mysterious figure of Man Power has been making waves for a while now. A series of mixes and remixes and frankly jaw-dropping EPs have seen his star rise, though his actual profile has remained obscured – largely by his hand in a series of promo shots. His true identity remains a secret. So, who is Man Power and why should you care?The first of those questions will remain unanswered. The second is, in any case the more important. You should care because this is clever music aimed at the head, heart and feet, made by an artist capable of wringing emotion out of machines in a way that, if I’ Read more ...
Barney Harsent
Hot Chip are a band who have, over the years, brought a different personality to the hedonistic house party – one that often seems caught halfway between the kitchen and the designated dancefloor. This, their sixth album, sees them trying to edge their way towards the latter while questioning their place – and relevance – in the wider musical firmament.Things kick off well enough with “Huarache Lights”, a song strong enough even to bear the weight of a hamfisted First Choice sample and hackneyed Daft Punk-esque vocoder and still cross the finishing line smiling. Similarly, the fidgity bounce Read more ...
Barney Harsent
Back in the Seventies, in between keeping an eye out for the unwanted attentions of radio DJs and waiting for punk, the internet or colours to happen, there was real beauty if you knew where to look. By which I mean telly, of course. From the haunting fairground tones of the introduction to schools programme Picture Box, to the rolling sci-fi thrill of The Tomorrow People theme, it seemed that, far from not wanting to scare the horses, these oddball music makers would have sampled their galloping retreat and used it as a rhythm track for an animated short about a deaf boy and his magic snail. Read more ...
Barney Harsent
So, what I’m probably supposed to do when reviewing Django Django’s new album, Born Under Saturn, is mention the sleeper-hit success of their 2012 self-titled debut. I’m then definitely supposed to do a funny and find some suitable similes before summing up with something pithy and sage. The trouble is, I’m stuck here grinning like an idiot while thoughts flit in and out without ever finding room to land. Melodies can do that to you – stop you thinking and drag you into the moment, where meaningful reflection is all but impossible. Like being really pissed, but without the hangover. What Read more ...
Guy Oddy
In his recent theartsdesk interview, Squarepusher (or Tom Jenkinson to his mum) stated: “A subtle wave of conservatism has washed gently across electronic music over the last five years. One of the things the new record smashes against is that.” On this he really isn’t kidding, and Damogen Furies is unlikely to be heard as mood music to your shopping experience in any high street stores in the foreseeable future. Hardcore rave sounds bump up against abrasive electro and abstract funk in a powerful tempest that is far from chilled out.Opening track “Stor Eiglass” suggests an imaginary remix of Read more ...