Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

Like Aphex Twin, Autechre were about as close to being experimental techno superstars as the tenets of their genre and the limitations of their audience allowed. Through a series of full-length works and a smattering of EPs on Warp, Clear, and their own Skam label, Autechre consistently garnered the praise of press and public alike. Unlike many of their more club-bound colleagues, however, Autechre's Sean Booth and Rob Brown had roots planted firmly in American electro, and though the more mood-based, sharply digital texture of their update seemed to speak otherwise, it was through early 12"s like Egyptian Lover's "Egypt, Egypt," Grandmaster Flash's "Scorpio," and "Pretty" Tony Butler's "Get Some" that their combined aesthetic began to form.

Booth and Brown met through a mutual friend, trading junked-up pause-button mixtapes of their favorite singles back and forth. Happening onto some bargain basement analog gear through questionable circumstances, the pair began experimenting with their own music before they were out of high school. After some disastrous experiences with a few small labels, the pair sent a tape off to Warp Records, whose early releases by Sweet Exorcist, Nightmares on Wax, and B12 were announcing a new age in U.K.-based techno (and one in which Autechre would become a key component). Releasing a handful of early singles through the label, Autechre's first stabs were collected on their debut full-length, Incunabula, as well as the 10" box set remix EP Basscadet.

Subsequent albums reached a wider audience through stateside reissue, first on Wax Trax!/TVT, later on Nothing (the label managed by Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor), and finally through a stateside branch of Warp. Although stylistically rooted, affectations for the ponderous extend beyond their name and track titles ("C/Pach," "Bronchusevenmx24"), with the basic premise of their approach being music without a whole lot of stylistic baggage but plenty of DSP'ed-to-death hyper-programming. Later albums Untilted (2005), Quaristice (2008), Oversteps (2010), Move of Ten (2010), and the two-hour Exai (2013) were not as groundbreaking, yet Autechre easily retained one of the most distinctive sounds in the world of electronica.

In addition to Autechre, Booth and Brown released material as Gescom on their own Skam imprint and through the Clear label, most notably the Sounds of Machines Our Parents Used EP on the latter. The group also provided a number of memorable remixes (oftentimes more memorable than the original material) for artists including Palmskin Productions, Slowly, Mike Ink, DJ Food, Scorn, Skinny Puppy, Tortoise, Phoenecia, Various Artists, the Black Dog, Apparat, and the Bug.

Sean Cooper, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

Despite the dozens of experimental electronics producers constantly nipping at their heels, Autechre remained at the forefront of academic sound processing with a highly awaited sixth full album. Whether pushing the next new thing in 2001 is enough to keep listeners coming back to this LP years later is a much different question, and the assault of non-rhythmic beats sprayed all over Confield is enough to keep most from even trying. Opener "VI Scose Poise" is a bouncing-ball-in-a-ring-modulator production that reveals only a few of Autechre's excellent minor-key melodies, while the second off, "Cfern," keeps listeners guessing as well with a parade of conflicting rhythms and head-spinning beats. In fact, it's a palpable relief when "Cfern" leads directly into more straightforward electro territory with "Pen Expers." There are faint glimpses of the melancholy beauty of Autechre's early work, but this experimental, rigidly academic work is a record to respect, not enjoy.

Review by John Bush, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

After an LP and several EPs of baffling, beat-damaged digital concrete, Autechre was definitely due for a change. Rob Brown and Sean Booth have never turned in a substandard production, but 2001's cold, dispirited Confield merely flaunted their programming prowess instead of offering music that listeners could enjoy. Something less than a radical reinvention, Draft 7.30 does return the duo to the more inviting climes of past masterpieces like Tri Repetae (if not Basscadet). The record is immediately more compelling than Confield, with less focus on their trademarked random-beat-making software. A few melodies, suitably obtuse and wispy, creep in as well. "V-Proc" is an excellent production, somehow spacious and claustrophobic at the same time, with stuttered percussion and a hip-hop beat pounding away in the background. "61e.CR" and "P.:Ntil" also have glimpses of a repetitive beat, even if the usual recycle bin of percussion noise nearly overwhelms them near the end. The 12-minute "Surripere" is an epic of deliciously chilly atmospheres, though the usual Autechre beat madness could've used a timeout. Most importantly, though, the duo has pulled away from the brink; no one ever doubted that Autechre was at the extreme of experimental techno for its own sake, but given a record like Draft 7.30, listeners might actually return for multiple listens.

Review by John Bush, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

During the '90s, before Autechre's Sean Booth and Rob Brown became fully enamored of their audio software, they were masters of electronic composition. They built tracks that were epic and slowly unfolding ("Bike") or jarring and tight ("Eutow"), but always original and usually surprisingly infectious. After pursuing their theories of digital noise down a rabbit hole for several years, they returned to what had made their name with an uncharacteristically bright record in 2003 (Draft 7.30) and a continuation of that sound with 2005's Untilted. Booth and Brown work more with discernible drum samples here, compared to their prior focus on metalloid beats, and they have also rediscovered the value of pausing slightly before the digital merry-go-round begins another circuit. The duo haven't lost their refusal to compromise; the kinetic opener "LCC" is halted abruptly just as it gains steam – around the 7:20 mark. Overall, it's clear they're simply spending more time with the construction of their tracks than the processing of their beats. Close to 15 years after their formation, Autechre certainly aren't launching any new styles, and there's no innovative music to be heard here, but Untilted does represent the duo returning to the green fields of their youth after a few years sowing their wild oats.

Review by John Bush, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

"Unified" and "cohesive" would not be two of the first couple hundred words used to describe Quaristice, the first Autechre album since 2005's Untilted. The only aspect that prevents Quaristice from seeming open-ended, as a bunch of tracks splayed arbitrarily across a disc, is that it begins and ends with ambient (as in entirely beat-less) pieces; an arc might gradually become apparent, but that would only be the result of increased familiarity with the sequence of tracks. It's disparate, to say the very least, but that is not at the listener's expense. Just by glancing at the length of the track list, it's apparent the album is not standard-operating Autechre; at 73 minutes in length, most of the 20 tracks are more like vignettes, yet the ideas arrive fully formed, never appearing to be dashed off or loosely sketched. The variety of ideas is nearly imposing, the best of which include the deadened chiming and clanging of "Simmm," the stealth jitter of "Tankakern," the Drexciya-worthy pitch-black neo-electro of "Rale," and the handful of stunning and duly swarthy ambient tracks – especially the closing 12 minutes shared by the chilling "Notwo" and "Outh9x" tandem. A couple moments, unsurprisingly, border on the inscrutable, with "Fol3" sounding like a collage of car collisions and slammed doors smeared and backmasked for nearly four minutes, and "bnc Cstl" more like a hyper-speed gag of sound effects, its high hats and snares tucked deeply into the mix. While it can take some time to get a handle on its generous stream of components, Quaristice is far from just another Autechre album. Not since LP5 has being impressed been so obviously secondary to enjoyment.

Review by Andy Kellman, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

Autechre, seemingly disregarding fans' worries about quality control, issued the Move of Ten mini-LP just a few short months after the Oversteps LP, and virtually every track here could stand proudly on a full-length. If anything, the tracks on Move of Ten range farther than its companion LP, and with close to 50 minutes of music, it's nearly as impressive an achievement as Oversteps. With just a few exceptions, it's heavily percussive and effects-focused, although melodic undertones do emerge occasionally, as on the highlight, "nth Dafuseder.b."

Review by John Bush, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

Despite their prowess with programming, Sean Booth and Rob Brown have been critics' darlings since the birth of IDM because their music is interesting – not just innovative. Whether long ("Bike") or criminally short ("Eutow"), early Autechre tracks gained praise because they were brilliantly moody and memorably melodic. Oversteps, the duo's tenth full-length in 20 years, is more of the same (in a good way). Introducing the record is "R Ess," which reveals just a hint of the cavernous atmospherics highlighting the album. Make no mistake, the beats are coming, as is the dread synth (that sounds like The Terminator reborn), but it's all done in the context of music that is as engaging as it is experimental. Even on "Qplay," one of the most jarring tracks with its continual clash of beats and effects, Autechre find the beauty in technical rigor.

Review by John Bush, Allmusic.com

×

Autechre - Albums Collection 2001-2013 (8CD) Japanese Releases

Close

Active listening to the entirety of Exai (as in "eleven") is, of course, an endurance test, as it is 120 minutes in length and consists of 17 tracks that could be sequenced in any order with no change of effect. Processing the whole thing is less daunting than it seems on the surface. It begins with the hyper-speed scramble-clutter of "Fleure," but beneath that, there is a bounty of tracks that are riveting and accessible, if by Autechre's challenging and meticulously crafted standard. Several standouts, once fully absorbed, sound utterly unique. "Bladelores," one of three captivating tracks that lasts over ten minutes, has a probing skank to it with a nearly piercing acid line over a buried and blurred symphony. The energizing and abnormally uplifting "T ess xi," led by a direct synthesizer melody and crunching drums, could pass as a remix of something from West London's broken beat massive. "Recks On," somehow crisp and sludgy, is a peculiar hybrid of big beat and bass and is one of the heaviest pieces the duo has produced. The album could have been pared down a bit, yet it's a drop in a bucket for Booth and Brown. Prior to this, their discography clocked in at 18 hours or so. What's another two hours?

Review by Andy Kellman, Allmusic.com