electronica
Video Exclusive: TunngTuesday, 11 June 2013![]() Almost a decade on from their debut album, Tunng’s founding folktronic ethos no longer carries the shock of the new, but the sprawling and vaguely mystical collective continue to make ever more beautiful and interesting sounds. Turbines, their fifth... Read more... |
CD: Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's HarvestTuesday, 04 June 2013![]() Boards of Canada have it nailed. If we are to believe what we’re told, Scottish brothers Michael Sandison and Marcus Eoin are semi-permanently holed up in rustic heathlands south-west of Edinburgh, beavering with mystical intensity at analogue... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Rodion G.A., Dudley Moore, Four Tet, Cheap TrickSunday, 26 May 2013![]() Rodion G.A.: The Lost TapesInitially, under Nicolae Ceaușescu, Romania’s borders were open: Blood Sweat & Tears, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong played there. But the regime tightened its grip after the dictator’s 1971 visit to North Korea... Read more... |
The Knife, RoundhouseThursday, 09 May 2013![]() Nine people are on stage. Male and female. None is singing. All are dancing. No instruments are being played. For a 20-minute, three-song segment of Swedish art-dance electro-tricksters The Knife’s London show the sound was of a live concert, but... Read more... |
CD: Friedman & Liebezeit - Secret Rhythms 5Tuesday, 30 April 2013![]() It's pretty impressive that at 74 years old, the drummer Jaki Liebezeit should still be one of the most vital musicians on the planet. Maybe not all that surprising, though. From the moment in 1968 when he switched from free jazz to the narcotic... Read more... |
CD: Morris Cowan - Six DegreesMonday, 15 April 2013![]() Some 20 years ago, a series of albums called Artificial Intelligence on WARP Records aimed to promote techno as home-listening music. They made up a frequently sublime collection, but unfortunately the word “intelligence” in their title was picked... Read more... |
CD: The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - MosquitoWednesday, 10 April 2013![]() On hearing the opening track of this album, a friend said “I didn't expect to be listening to new albums of the YYYs 10 years on!” And this is kind of understandable: of all the new rock bands of the early 2000s – The Strokes, The Vines, The Hives,... Read more... |
CD: The Knife - Shaking the HabitualSaturday, 06 April 2013![]() Shaking The Habitual’s centrepiece – the seventh of its 14 tracks – is the 19-minute “Old Dreams Waiting to be Realized”. A tone which ebbs in and out, it’s occasionally underpinned by distant rhythmic colour. Although thoughts inevitably turn to... Read more... |
CD: Lapalux - NostalchicThursday, 21 March 2013![]() To the left of the electronic pop that dominates radio and the charts sits music which is that bit artier, emanating more class, imagination and sonic inventiveness. Think SBTRKT, Jessie Ware, Frank Ocean or Aluna George. Far, far to the left of... Read more... |
CD: Depeche Mode - Delta MachineWednesday, 20 March 2013![]() The portents were good. The single “Heaven” emerged with all the melodrama and crypto-religiosity hardcore Depeche Mode fans have loved – Dave Gahan hitting some notes that suggested he's spotted certain tics that Muse's Matt Bellamy has nicked from... Read more... |
CD: Dinos Chapman – LuftboblerSunday, 03 March 2013![]() It’s enough to make any bedroom electronicist green with envy. A home experimenter releases their debut album to instant attention. Under normal circumstances, another Squarepusher wannabe would be hard pushed getting anyone to take much notice.... Read more... |
Four Tet & Fiium Shaark, HeavenFriday, 01 March 2013![]() Walking into the auditorium of a packed Heaven last night, we were instantly treated to the sensation of having our bodies invaded by thousands of infinitely complex machine insects. It's rare that a band can have such an instant and disquieting... Read more... |
