back when the black dog and autechre peel sessions circulated in
various electronic formats, i did not bother to chase after them as i
believed that eventually they would be released in one form or another.
it seems that i have turned to a materialist, but i really enjoy having
the peel session triplet as tangible objects, not just bits on my hard
disk. yes, it is the music that counts, but being more or less marginal
in a commercial sense, it is important that people who appreciate the
music should support the artists that compose it. i am not putting up
a fight with those who do not care about the issue of copyright, just
stating bluntly that those who deem the music worthy enough for listening
should pay for the privilege to do so (and i do not mean the monthly
connection fee for the local isp). but enough of that.
temporally, the autechre ep falls between 'amber' and 'tri repetae'
(as far as i can judge from the actual transmission date) and at least
for me, the music reflects this period. angry, effect-heavy sounds
with the beginnings of the mathematical-sounding rhythm programming
found from 'tri repetae' onwards. 'drane' is an absolutely stunning
track, the string layer modulated with something that sounds like
heavy machinery. since i got the record today and listened to it just
once before coming to work, i have yet to reflect on 'milk dx' and
'inhake 2'. on a first listen, the ep is a perfect addition to anyone's
autechre collection.
the black dog ep is what black dog was. hyperactive rhythm programming
with rather difficult twists and turns, beautiful melodies and very
interesting chord intervals. as with the autechre ep, i got it today so
no deeper thoughts as of yet, but the ep does bring back a lot of good
memories from the 'artificial intelligence' series era.
the boards of canada ep is stunning, with 'olson' as the high moment.
i especially like the effect of the sampled dissonant choir (sampled
from 2001, i would gather) running behind the rhythm and melody. it
creates an eerie effect, and i can really see the monolith floating in
space (consequently, a few weeks back i was playing an ambient set and
the organisers had set up a video screen in the room; guess what was
showing?). also, the change of rhythm from broken beats to an overlaid
straight one nearer to the end is a touch of grace. the vocal sample
and the seagulls give a nice ambient feeling, too. as for the others,
'aquarius' and 'happy cycling', they are not as strong on their own,
but as a collective whole, the ep gives everything i could hope for
just one record. 'olson' makes this ep a almost better than the
first boards of canada on skam.
as for the design, i still find designers republic to be one of the
designer collectives worthy of respect. just the facts, nothing else.
blank space is beautiful. i do have a bias on this, because i tend to
go towards clean layouts and readability in what small bits i do that
could be considered as graphic design. i have been reading
too much on visual display of information lately, so there is one bias
as well. but i like the covers in all their plainness (compare to
autechre's last album - the round cardboard sleeves are a touch of
genius).
i am scraping the surface here, but i wanted to bring forth my
subjective view on this matter. some might feel that warp are cashing
in; i think they are not. for those that are not under the umbrella to
hear the actual peel transmissions and are too lazy and/or too morally
rigid (like me) to hunt after the bootlegs, this triplet is essential.
on a side note, a 74-minute slice of the abovementioned ambient set
will be available on-line in realaudio really soon, in addition to my
other set at the same party with more difficult dance material, which
was mostly autechre and gescom tracks with some boards of canada, link
and others thrown in. i will throw a note on the list when they are
on-line.
--
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