Aphex Twin classic or Dud?

Yeah see I've been listening to him since I ws like 15 and never, ever thought that stuff meant anything outside of maybe "oh geez I HAVE to do an interview, so". I just really loved his records and tbh I'm p sure everyone else I've ever known that liked his music thought the same. Why do interviews etc matter?

Speaking as a colonial btw

why does anything matter?

sorry, that was facetious but unless we're going to talk about specific pitches or rhythm templates or whatever, then what else is there to discuss? A big part of the Aphex/RDJ 'thing' is the way he built up a mythos around himself in a time when techno producers generally hid behind their equipment. It looks like he's continuing to do so now. The difference today is that people are a lot more receptive to bullshit, because internet, photoshop etc, so now it seems he's doing it by coming across as genuine as possible but still slipping in massive lies about himself.

Shouldn't there be a dedicated thread for the new album?

I say let's do it when it comes out.

That's OK cos I ws being p facetious myself. I just kinda suspect that mythos you talk abt didn't exist outside of the UK as anything but a tiny sideline to his actual records, whereas it seems to've dominated how he ws perceived there

I think it varies from fan to fan. When I ran an IDM-based online community in the late-90s/early-00s I spoke to a lot of Twin fans in both the UK And the US, and the perception of RDJ and how his fans treated his persona was felt pretty much equally. I'd dare say it was the US fans who were slightly more caught up in the mythos because to them the idea of an electronic maniac from Cornwall was much more exotic than the British perception of a jaded ex-raver who'd moved to London and got lucky doing mobile phone adverts. But yeah, what matters to some doesn't matter at all to others.

Yeah, maybe I just got lucky. I basically just thought he ws some anonymous guy who made SAW2 (which is a kinda mythosmaking thing in itself) and everything else came v much second

Maybe we can have one thread for Dog Latin to just bang on about how IDM was back in the 90s, and another thread for everyone else to just discuss the new album, interviews, etc.

why are you always so rude with me Bran?

> Maybe we can have one thread for Dog Latin to just bang on about how IDM was back in the 90s

would bookmark

I think discussion of aphex twin's previous form & reception is fair game for the aphex twin classic or dud thread tbh

Some of this dude's albums are classics

Or maybe just the one

Dog Latin etc talking abt techno in the 90s beats the fuck out of Branwell talking abt Aphex interviews, tbf

we're talking about the same things, really.

Aphex is very, very good but I don't really think he is the pre-eminent musical genius of 90s dance music. Still, the press built him up into that role because visibly having a personality and being good in interviews really, really worked for him. The NME in particular lapped that shit up.

The discourse around him is still way less annoying than the culture of reverence around Villalobos, the equivalent 00s figure.

I never realised Villalobos had a big personality cult?

He didn't but his music was so good it got made up for him (goes for RDJ and VILLALOBOS)

Ppl like to have a singular figure they can be into

ILM in a nutshell here, really:

I say something like "People like AFX interviews because RDJ provided a personality as opposed to faceless techno" and everyone goes STFU Branwell.

Doggie Latin and Matt DC come along to say "People like AFX interviews because RDJ provided a personality as opposed to faceless techno" and everyone goes OMG BRAVO WHAT AN AMAZING POINT WELL PUT.

It doesn't matter what I say on ILM because never mind, A Man will be along in ten minutes to say exactly the same thing, then everyone will applaud.

woooo doggie

Who said STFU? Who is 'everyone'? As far as my own intentions were concerned I was tacitly agreeing with your post until you told me to get lost and find my own thread.

I'm not sure why you read such an act of ~hostility~ from suggesting that a thread might be split in two, as it follows two distinct strands. Are you sure you're not projecting?

A mere suggestion that you bang on in a different thread

For my part I did note that dog Latin was essentially making the exact same really obvious & oft-stated point as you which is why it was so delightfully odd that you would take exception to his posts

xpost

Hate to mansplain this to you, Brannywannydoo-dah, but if you can't figure out why one might read a certain hostility in this post...

Maybe we can have one thread for Dog Latin to just bang on about how IDM was back in the 90s, and another thread for everyone else to just discuss the new album, interviews, etc.

― Shugazi (Branwell with an N), Friday, September 5, 2014 11:00 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

...not to mention every other time you've told me, in no uncertain terms, to fuck off out of this thread over the years, then I can't answer your question. As far as I know I have never spoken to you in this way and if I have then I apologise, but I have a feeling that's never going to be good enough. Good day to you.

It's quite a challop to suggest that Dog Latin of all posters benefits from an automatically bestowed aura of respect.

Wow.

Can we have a thread about the new Aphex Twin album now, please?

Anticipating SYRO the new (2014) album by Aphex Twin

tbh I think "dog latin banging on about 90's IDM" is just as valid for this thread as "I wish he didn't do interviews like this" or w/e

DOG LATIN

well this thread certainly got http://www.gadgetreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/cray-cx1-with-nvidia1.jpg

jaded ex-raver who'd moved to London and got lucky doing mobile phone adverts

haha i had no idea! is this how a lot of people heard his stuff for the first time? which tracks?

To Cure A Weakling Child was used quite prominently in an Orange mobile advert around 1997. I don't think it's the way most people discovered him (obv SAWII and several other releases came before) but that half of the Come To Daddy EP used the Orange mobile branding on the cover so it might have been an 'in' for some.

http://sleevage.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/cometodaddy_cd2_right.gif

In that Rolling Stone piece he says he 'came up to London to do press,' but then he says he lives in Scotland. Kinda makes you wonder.

it does?

He also stated he came by train. In UK usage, railway lines almost always go "up" to London. It's not a geographical direction, it's a "towards city centre" terminology when people say they are going "up" London.

Ah! I've learned a lot here.

This is apparently the last track on the album. Ridiculously gorgeous performance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJHsT8kEyzs

It's quite a challop to suggest that Dog Latin of all posters benefits from an automatically bestowed aura of respect.

Indeed, he's often the ilx whipping boy... (re-posted from the worst music writing thread..)

http://i491.photobucket.com/albums/rr277/kadield/KickDog.gif

I live in Glasgow and travel to London by train and always say 'I'm Going Down South' or 'Down to London', I've never heard anyone traveling from Glasgow to London by train say they are "going up" to London

i wd always travel down to London as it is closer to hell than the North is

xp I guess old Cornish habits die hard

at about the same latitude as London, I have not come to any conclusion about whether London is up or down, except that I might get the train down to London and the bus up to London, because those are more euphonious pairings

actually I think it's the other way round

don't mind me

as a desperate attempt to be on topic, I quite liked that first track, but if it is the best track on the album then I'm not 100% sold yet (who am I kidding, I'll probably preorder)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_directions

In British practice, railway directions are usually described as up and down, with up being towards a major location. This convention is applied not only to the trains and the tracks, but also to items of lineside equipment and to areas near a track. Since British trains run on the left, the up side of a line is on the left when proceeding in the up direction. The names originate from the early railways, where trains would run up the hills to the mines, and down to the ports.

On most of the network, up is the direction towards London. In most of Scotland, with the exception of the West and East Coast Main Lines, up is towards Edinburgh. The Valley Lines network around Cardiff has its own peculiar usage, relating to the original meaning of travelling up and down the valley. On the former Midland Railway up was towards Derby. Mileposts normally increase in the down direction

Individual tracks will have their own names, such as Up Main or Down Loop. Trains running towards London are normally referred to as Up trains, and those away from London as Down. Hence the Down Night Riviera runs to Penzance and the Up Flying Scotsman to Kings Cross.

I mean, it's entirely possible that Richard's reference is more that Cornish habit of calling everything on the other side of the Tamar "Up Country", but technically and officially, "up" is towards London. (And after discussion on twitter, it emerges that in Ireland, all trains going towards Dublin are "up", regardless of geographical direction.)

Derail

A bit like RAM, the track-by-track reviews from the listening parties have got me super excited. Fingers crossed.