i wouldn't know how to dance to it but i've seen it done. rustie doesn't come from a dubstep lineage though. there isn't much of that lineage in glasgow.
― stirmonster, Friday, 14 October 2011 17:48 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, he's pretty keen to distance himself from the dubstep label in interviews
― Number None, Friday, 14 October 2011 17:50 (twelve years ago) link
the hot beats juxtaposed against the over-the-top rave & '80s synth sounds is a big part of what makes it work for me. if it was a four-on-the-floor record, it would probably tip over into schlock.
― hardcore oatmeal (Jordan), Friday, 14 October 2011 17:53 (twelve years ago) link
I am very excited about seeing Rustie, in Glasgow, tonight, what with this being out and him being a Glasgow native and all that.
― ha ha ha ha jack my swag (boxedjoy), Friday, 14 October 2011 18:20 (twelve years ago) link
Report back on the amount/style of dancing
― Number None, Friday, 14 October 2011 18:23 (twelve years ago) link
This sort of minimal-attention-span nonsense has kind of awakened the question of what horrors we'd have got had Warp artists tried to make drill'n'trance a thing 10 years ago.
A bit like drill and bass it's kind of baseline enjoyable in its silliness and shameless rushiness but beat-wise and groove-wise it's completely functionally useless as dance music.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, October 12, 2011 5:16 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark
i'm enjoying this album but after reading matt's post i'd been expecting something really CRAZY and INTENSE and SCHIZOPHRENIC and it's really not? like what makes this "minimal-attention-span"? i guess the tracks are on the shorter side?
― congratulations (n/a), Thursday, 20 October 2011 16:14 (twelve years ago) link
agreed, most of the tracks have song-like structures that are very logical.
― hardcore oatmeal (Jordan), Thursday, 20 October 2011 17:37 (twelve years ago) link
― stirmonster, Friday, 14 October 2011 18:48 (6 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
― Number None, Friday, 14 October 2011 18:50 (6 days ago) Bookmark
<3 rustie
― nakhchivan, Thursday, 20 October 2011 17:42 (twelve years ago) link
some excellent writing about this album:
http://www.dummymag.com/reviews/2011/10/24/rustie-glass-swords/
― lex pretend, Wednesday, 26 October 2011 10:46 (twelve years ago) link
This is probably closer to people like Crystal Castles and Justice than it is to dubstep, yeah.
It's good music to play Mario Kart to, I have discovered.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 26 October 2011 10:51 (twelve years ago) link
Listened to the first three tracks from this in a shop on Monday. Must say I was fairly blown away. That Dummy mag description is the most accurate I've read so far. Have now ordered the CD.
― Jeff W, Wednesday, 26 October 2011 14:36 (twelve years ago) link
nice review, and it totally seems like rustie and hudmo are having fun trying to one-up each other. i don't hear it as a difficult listen at all though, it's pure pleasure.
― this is unusual for batman. (Jordan), Wednesday, 26 October 2011 14:42 (twelve years ago) link
agree with "emotive love letter" from that review, and wish the writer had expanded on that a bit. the primary appeal for me is the pathos of all the ravey flourishes.
― lukas, Wednesday, 26 October 2011 15:59 (twelve years ago) link
WOW...just fucking WOW !!!
beat-wise and groove-wise it's completely functionally useless as dance music.
bad workmen always blame their tools.
if you can't dance to this, you probably just can't dance
― meat to pleased you (flame grilled meat), Thursday, 27 October 2011 04:44 (twelve years ago) link
^^^ this. How is this not-danceable? Each track is a banger.
That said, there's something a little flat-plan about the production that makes it at once exhausting and less punchy as the album wears on. It's better enjoyed track-by-track imo.
― dog latin, Thursday, 27 October 2011 09:12 (twelve years ago) link
Like I said, it's full of the sonic signifiers of dancing - europhoric trance synths, enormous hooks and what have you - but without the beats and momentum underneath that make dance music. It's all icing, no cake.
The Dusted review above actually agrees with me that it's not particularly concerned with the dancefloor in the first place. Feels like a headphone/living room record to me.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 27 October 2011 09:34 (twelve years ago) link
It certainly helped me get the washing up done, although Ultra Thizz is one of the only one's I'd like to see played out. Then again, it does happily sit between Justice-style electro, big-room dubstep and IDM, so it's the eclectic DJ's wet dream. But it ain't straight dance, no. It all depends on what you wanna hear on the dancefloor. There's so much brostep stuff that sounds rhythmically disjointed out there and people go bonkers to that. Personally I love the disorientating switches in tempo/signature and don't think they make it anti-dance; it just keeps things interesting and fun. So yeah, it's kind of the Skrillex it's okay to like (mostly cos the metal/emo element is entirely removed).
― dog latin, Thursday, 27 October 2011 10:27 (twelve years ago) link
Music like this requires a new way of dancing to it. If you just want to get your standard groove on, fine, but if you want to push the limits of your particular dancing 'style' you will be rewarded.
I say, do what Rustie did with the sonic signifiers and apply it to your body movement, but then again i tend not to dance to the beat of the kick snare. It's all about the hi hats, rolls, fills and breaks.
― meat to pleased you (flame grilled meat), Thursday, 27 October 2011 20:15 (twelve years ago) link
i'm surprised that people only seem to dance to one element of a track. dance to the melodies!!
― lex pretend, Thursday, 27 October 2011 23:14 (twelve years ago) link
My hips dance to the kick/snare, my feet to the hi hats, my hands/fingers to the melody/chords and my head to some shit only i can hear. Sometimes i open my eyes on the dancefloor and find i've cleared quite a little space around me.
― meat to pleased you (flame grilled meat), Friday, 28 October 2011 00:25 (twelve years ago) link
Look I am trying to find nice ways of saying that this is really nerdy funkless music, okay? And that's alright! The music itself is pretty explicitly acknowledging how dorky it is.
― Matt DC, Friday, 28 October 2011 10:51 (twelve years ago) link
This is all true, and I don't think "a lack of funk" is necessarily a bad thing (other elements of this more than make up for it - it's certainly got ENERGY). But where is it explicitly acknowledging its nerdiness?
― dog latin, Friday, 28 October 2011 10:56 (twelve years ago) link
Because it's like 80% prog rock and video games?
― Matt DC, Friday, 28 October 2011 10:58 (twelve years ago) link
prog rock?!?!
i disagree, this album's strength is its sugar rush obviousness, it's the opposite of nerding out over complex rhythms or abstract sounds
― lex pretend, Friday, 28 October 2011 11:00 (twelve years ago) link
There are prog rock synths and occasionally guitar noises all over this. But then there are prog rock synths over a lot of music I like from the last few years.
Sugar rush obviousness can be nerdy as well in its own right, especially given that most of this record sounds like an overdriven Nintendo soundtrack. I'm not even saying it's bad - it's very stupid, very enjoyable, ridiculously nerdy.
― Matt DC, Friday, 28 October 2011 11:05 (twelve years ago) link
http://i.imgur.com/tXXEV.jpg
― nakhchivan, Friday, 28 October 2011 11:09 (twelve years ago) link
I think it's a bit of both. There's something really studied about those ravey builds and rush-ups. There's quite a lot of music coming out at the moment (some of Bass Clef's work is another example) that explores a kind of poignant nostalgia for what rave could have been. I guess it's not far removed from what people like Luke Vibert were doing 10-15 years ago, but these are "children of rave", i.e. they probably grew up hearing Tricky Disco and Charly Says on the radio and somehow feel that world needs a deeper excavation with more advanced technology.
― dog latin, Friday, 28 October 2011 11:12 (twelve years ago) link
Is that Rustie? Christ, he looks about 15. To him early dance music must sound like what Led Zepp sounds like to me....
― dog latin, Friday, 28 October 2011 11:13 (twelve years ago) link
Someone's stolen his umbrella
― R. Stornoway (Tom D.), Friday, 28 October 2011 11:14 (twelve years ago) link
nerdy ? funkless ? dorky ? you haven't confused Rustie with Reso in power extreme mode have you ?
I'm just not getting the prog rock thing. At least not in a way i do from something like lol - me me, which along with this, is shaping up to be among my top picks of the year.
― meat to pleased you (flame grilled meat), Friday, 28 October 2011 11:59 (twelve years ago) link
Rustie is definitely a big prog fan, as is Hudson Mohawke
― Number None, Friday, 28 October 2011 12:29 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.theskinny.co.uk/music/features/300374-rustie_appliance_science
Glass Swords is also informed by music that pre-dates, and in many cases directly influences, hip-hop and techno. Rustie cites prog-rock pioneers Yes and the jazz fusion of Allan Holdsworth as pivotal (you can hear the latter's imprint all over the album’s titular opening track, an intoxicating perfume of flutes and chopped choral vocals that swirl around a naïvely epic, pedal-heavy guitar solo), as well as the pejoratively titled genre of 'yacht rock', as Rustie puts it – a "sort of smooth, sort of jazzy sort of rock from the 80s" – of which Michael McDonald and the Doobie Brothers were prolific practitioners
― Lars and the Lulu Girl (NickB), Friday, 28 October 2011 12:35 (twelve years ago) link
Im hearing Vince Clarke and Trevor Horn in Rusties sound palette more than anything. That'll be where the Clarke/YES thing comes in i suppose, combined with the ethos of Horn's collab with Malcolm Mclaren on Duck Rock. But the mish mash pastiche of reappropriated sounds reminds me most of Tim Simenon's breakthough with Beat Dis albeit with analogue patches rather than samples.
― you want fries with that (flame grilled meat), Saturday, 29 October 2011 10:39 (twelve years ago) link
Is that Rustie? Christ, he looks about 15.
He looks like an exuberant Pokemon.
― Matt DC, Saturday, 29 October 2011 19:33 (twelve years ago) link
This album has been occupying my thoughts quite a lot recently. I had a very mixed reaction to it initially – I found the relentless maximalism and OTT-ness of it and the garish sounds and textures offputting and attention-grabbing at the same time - but I’ve come to get over most of my irritation with it and have been giving it a lot of play.Matt, I’d have to disagree with you slightly about the undanceability of it. What you say about ‘standing in the middle of the dancefloor making manic largin' it hand gestures rather than actually dancing’ applies pretty perfectly to a tune like Ultra Thizz for sure, and then there’s tunes like the title track andIce Tunnel which are beatless, but – going off the top of my head here – Flash Back, Surph, After Light and City Star are all tunes with more consistent beats to them that I can imagine people doing something closer to conventional dancing to. I think the influence from crunk and Southern rap club-bangers that’s always been a part of his sound is part of what gives his tunes a degree of forward momentum.Someone on dissensus was saying that it’s all the little moments and little details in the production that make this album for him, and that’s def a part of it – you can listen it many times over and notice a cool new detail each time. But on the other hand it’s an album full of big melodies and HOOKS that reach out and grab you straight away. It’s also relentlessly ‘up’ in terms of its mood, which I find kind of endearing, it almost has an innocence to it.
― Mr Andy M, Tuesday, 15 November 2011 12:40 (twelve years ago) link
I finally made peace with my not being able to get into this! I'm just on the wrong side of Lex & Tim's sonic nerd vs rhythm nerd dichotomy. This is a total sonic nerd album where the beats are kind of an afterthought to all the bright synths and I'm one a rhythm nerd, so of course Lex loves it and it leaves me indifferent.
― The Reverend, Thursday, 19 January 2012 07:42 (twelve years ago) link
I guess this was kind of hashed out upthread. Matt DC otm
― The Reverend, Thursday, 19 January 2012 07:44 (twelve years ago) link
this stuff is very impressive but does nothing for me.
― TracerHandVEVO (Tracer Hand), Thursday, 19 January 2012 11:25 (twelve years ago) link
totally
― The Reverend, Thursday, 19 January 2012 11:41 (twelve years ago) link
relistening now and it still puts as massive a grin on my face as when i first heard it. so many hooks! so many amazing noises!
― irina-camelia begu (lex pretend), Thursday, 19 January 2012 11:47 (twelve years ago) link
impossible not to move to it
My kids like putting on 'Ultra Thizz' and running round the kitchen table having pretend lazer fights.
― Derartu Cthulhu (NickB), Thursday, 19 January 2012 12:09 (twelve years ago) link
I like to do that too.
― I want your nose, your shoes and your unicycle (dog latin), Thursday, 19 January 2012 12:10 (twelve years ago) link
This is a total sonic nerd album where the beats are kind of an afterthought to all the bright synths and I'm one a rhythm nerd, so of course Lex loves it and it leaves me indifferent.
totally disagree, this is a super rhythm nerd record. so many of the tracks are based on a clever rhythmic hook or idea, they sound like a drummer wrote them.
― the third kind of dubstep (Jordan), Thursday, 19 January 2012 15:53 (twelve years ago) link
not sure if i'd use the word clever.
― Porto for Pyros (The Cursed Return of the Dastardly Thermo Thinwall), Thursday, 19 January 2012 16:12 (twelve years ago) link
admittedly, i just don't get this record tho.
is it strange that i agree with nearly everything in this thread? this is catchy but not, in your face but not, rhythmic but not, interesting but not. It's like, I can listen to and enjoy it maybe three times and then I'm tired of it I guess. I'd like it to be a little MORE overall.
― I want your nose, your shoes and your unicycle (dog latin), Thursday, 19 January 2012 16:24 (twelve years ago) link
Really, this is a good tide-over until Girl Unit release an album and blow us all away.
― I want your nose, your shoes and your unicycle (dog latin), Thursday, 19 January 2012 16:25 (twelve years ago) link
Everything Girl Unit has put his hand to that hasn't been on the Wut EP has been pretty shonky.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 19 January 2012 16:28 (twelve years ago) link
i think 'after light' is a pretty smart idea (how he combines that classic rave dotted 8th note line with the half-time beat), well-executed.
but not quite as clever as the main beat in hudmo's 'thunder bay': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=my_Efk19OJw
― the third kind of dubstep (Jordan), Thursday, 19 January 2012 16:29 (twelve years ago) link
Pretty much.
― MikoMcha, Monday, 25 August 2014 19:20 (nine years ago) link
feels like a bit like offcuts from the first album, all the sounds are there but the impact is not. "velcro" is alright and so is the d double e one; danny brown sounds weird like he's half putting on a british grime mc's accent. pretty blah album tbh
― lex pretend, Tuesday, 26 August 2014 15:58 (nine years ago) link
Rapture is cool, I especially like the first four tracks. Then it goes a bit off the rails and never really recovers.
― MikoMcha, Tuesday, 26 August 2014 16:05 (nine years ago) link
ha, i felt the opposite - first half was most disappointing, got slightly better once it hit the rap tracks but never really hit the heights
― lex pretend, Tuesday, 26 August 2014 16:15 (nine years ago) link
just started playing glass swords again and while i mostly like it, it really is not the sort of thing i can listen to for very long
snd are similar in this respect
― Nothing less than the Spirit of the Age (nakhchivan), Thursday, 28 August 2014 17:26 (nine years ago) link
i used to like the early rustie eps from years ago, ep is probably the ideal format for him
i decided i only like the rap tracks
― the late great, Thursday, 28 August 2014 19:03 (nine years ago) link
like almost all the vocal tracks on this, esp the danny brown one, but i think the instrumentals are easy to underrate. definitely more subdued than GS, and less ambitious, and sometimes just a bit deficient (ie the total opposite of GS where nothing could be seen as being deficient), but they still sound like no one else. i think he was thinking more melodically on this album. maybe its him trying to get more producer work, or do something 'proper' rather than weird/funny like the last one, not sure, but its still good. hopefully he hasnt gotten too self conscious.
― StillAdvance, Friday, 29 August 2014 10:25 (nine years ago) link
Some parts of this album give me instant nostalgia for 80s arcade game soundtracks - I think its the general midi sounding slap bass noise he uses occasionally - but it takes me back to listening to this as an 8 year old: http://www.exotica.org.uk/wiki/6_Amazing_Coin-Op_Soundtracks_from_Virgin_Games
― Willl, Friday, 29 August 2014 10:57 (nine years ago) link
I'm quite sure that's intentional
― Number None, Friday, 29 August 2014 16:10 (nine years ago) link
anyone still listening to this? i think its a bit of a grower. every track with guest vocalists is great except the gorgeous children one, and even though theyre a bit sketchy, the instrumentals generally have enough good things going for them for me not to write this album off. it doesnt attack you like glass swords, but i dont see that as a negative. or maybe you just really have to be a big rustie fan.
― StillAdvance, Wednesday, 22 October 2014 18:37 (nine years ago) link
no Hudson Mohawke thread, huh? i'm sad that i haven't heard anything i like so far off the new Hud Mo album :(
(only heard the singles, not the full thing, i'm sure there will be a couple deep cut jams)
― lil urbane (Jordan), Tuesday, 9 June 2015 17:24 (eight years ago) link
Ryderz is such a banger
could've sworn he had his own thread but i can't find it either
― nose, Tuesday, 9 June 2015 17:27 (eight years ago) link
hahahahaha
http://soundcloud.com/rustie/first-mythz
― expertly crafted referential display name (Jordan), Monday, 2 November 2015 18:08 (eight years ago) link
listened to it thrice today
day's not over yet
― 0 / 0 (lukas), Monday, 2 November 2015 18:50 (eight years ago) link
um and apparently new album tomorrow?
https://soundcloud.com/rustie/peace-upzzz
― expertly crafted referential display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 4 November 2015 17:45 (eight years ago) link
better than the last one but still not as good as glass swords ....
― the late great, Thursday, 5 November 2015 08:04 (eight years ago) link
hope this gets released on cd.
― StillAdvance, Thursday, 5 November 2015 13:29 (eight years ago) link
oof this album is absolutely dreadful
― lex pretend, Thursday, 5 November 2015 17:47 (eight years ago) link
you mean absolutely brilliant and almost as good as glass swords
― StillAdvance, Thursday, 10 December 2015 17:41 (eight years ago) link
he announced on twitter a few days ago that he's no longer doing shows for the foreseeable future due to mental health/substance abuse issues :/
― Karl Rove Knausgård (jim in glasgow), Wednesday, 23 December 2015 21:53 (eight years ago) link
i need glass swords back on my phone
whats the verdict on the new album?
― F♯ A♯ (∞), Friday, 29 July 2016 20:54 (seven years ago) link
the reviews seem good...
but, i think it's very bad, and without getting too gossipy, i understand that warp were very unhappy with it, and it was recorded during a period of heavy substance dependency.
― ælərdaɪs (jim in vancouver), Friday, 29 July 2016 21:01 (seven years ago) link
huh, i remember the reviews being bad, but liking what i heard and thinking that i need to give it a good listen.
― sam jax sax jam (Jordan), Friday, 29 July 2016 21:07 (seven years ago) link
metacritic is 74%, pitchfork 7.3.
line from the pitchfork review:
"It is a rawer, scrappier record than either of his prior LPs, and the way he flips the bird at conventional notions of fidelity is almost punk."
part of warp's problem with it, it sounds terrible because he produced and mastered it himself
― ælərdaɪs (jim in vancouver), Friday, 29 July 2016 21:11 (seven years ago) link
ill hear a few tracks on youtube
but i did not like the second one at all and im afraid of the long track list of the third
― F♯ A♯ (∞), Friday, 29 July 2016 21:12 (seven years ago) link
it was better than green language but still nowhere near as good as glass swords, especially due to how rough-sounding it is
― ufo, Saturday, 30 July 2016 11:40 (seven years ago) link
I haven't really liked much by Rustie since Glass Swords, so I kind of forgot about how much I liked that album. Listening again now, and it still slaps.
― jaymc, Saturday, 7 December 2019 05:53 (four years ago) link
He hasn't done much since. :(
I think it's hard to overstate the impact that Glass Swords had (even if much of it is on EDM that's all worse than Glass Swords).
― change display name (Jordan), Saturday, 7 December 2019 13:36 (four years ago) link
I enjoy EVENIFUDONTBELIEVE. Has a cool vaporous quality where everything seems to be constantly fading into white noise.
― Mario Meatwagon (Moodles), Saturday, 7 December 2019 14:02 (four years ago) link
9 years on and it's still the album of the year for me
― Papa Triste (Thee Macallan 18 Year), Saturday, 7 December 2019 14:59 (four years ago) link
Globes has always been the standout imo
― nashwan, Saturday, 7 December 2019 22:37 (four years ago) link
After Light no question
― lukas, Sunday, 8 December 2019 03:01 (four years ago) link
So he released this excellence last April, can't imagine why I missed it: https://hypebeast.com/2020/4/rustie-russell-whyte-project-tease-new-song-music-video
And then nothing apparently?
― lukas, Friday, 4 June 2021 20:05 (two years ago) link