IS IT WASHAPOLL? - ILM ARTIST POLL #57 - AUTECHRE - RESULTS thread

well he was avowedly very forward-thinking

haha

the gantz image has me a keen anticipater of the cap.iv graphic

*muffled cough*

lol

post flagged.

So I put Cipater as my #1. I think it encapsulates everything I love about Autechre, and is also a significant track nostalgically for me as well. The opening crunchy hip hop beat is immediately engaging, and really builds on everything I enjoyed with Tri-Rep but with more expressiveness. The atmosphere is quietly ominous and the analog lead synths are sublime as they drench the background of the track with reverb and different percussion elements begin to fold into the mix. The opening grooves. A lot. Almost more so than any early/mid period Autechre. Additional elements come in play both rhythmically and melodically, and finally this bubbling undercurrent of squelchy synth tone comes in and the beat begins to start to mutate. You can tell these guys wanted to do more and have these pieces constantly evolve instead of evolving step by step; revisiting Chiastic really does seem to predict Confield and Draft. More and more does Cichlisuite and LP5 seem to awkwardly stick out in their catalog.

But that transition. When the breakdown happens my favorite synth tone Ae has ever produced fades in... the reverberated analog bass (see Medrey/Key Nell 3/Teartear for other examples of this bass... might be a Juno-106?) comes in menacingly and then begins to solo into the one of the most gorgeous melodic progressions these guys have put out. And then the beat reconstructs into a stronger groove and the layered snowy synths fade in as the lead bass continues to solo onward and upward in quite a syncopated, swing heavy flow. It's fucking gorgeous... and then the melody climbs an octave, the original bassline returns and the melody expands into becoming a nearly sustained arpgeggio. At this point, I usually always get chills.

Older Ae has always had this transcendent, almost spiritual melodic quality that I've always valued above their synaesthetic, sculptured, and "jazzier" material post LP5, and Cipater has always been that song for me that perfectly embodied this as well as having one my favorite beats they've ever produced. The Psi Onyx remix and Keynell 4 also exhibit these traits and are all in my top 5.

✓

Cipater and Maphive 6.1 are my favourite discoveries today, maybe Acroyear2 as well

Never been a fan of Cipater but will revisit after reading octobeard's post

Maphive is amazing, a medieval battlefield of a tune to which someone brings a broken piano during half time oranges

And its true. Chiastic Slide anticipates post-Confield Ae far more than LP5 or EP7. Those records are like a detour in some ways.

Last one for the next few hours (still have to process the last several images).

http://i.imgur.com/0i8W97u.jpg

10. Drane - 168 points | 6 votes | 1 #1 vote

thanks Leee,

Drane was high on my ballot!

great image too.

this is a ballad about cicadas

also it's brilliant & a shame i was turned onto it only after ballots were handed in. utterly gorgeous

the same source also alerted me just now to the existence of 'netlon sentinel', which is straight-up astonishing & should have resulted in the immediate abandonment of the radiohead electronica project

I have no idea why I didn't vote for "Drane", it might be their best ever "dramatic, slow-building epic".

autechre were always great but they attained sublimity when they largely concealed that syncopated/crunchy sound of the mid 90s and went further into granular synthesis and the excessive, abstracted process music of confied/draft/gg

I don't know anyone who listened to them in the 90's who would say this.

that is reassuring to me

drane is the best thing they did in the 1990s, thus one of the very best things made by anyone in that decade and ✓ to whoever voted it #1
the numbering of my list was mostly quite arbitrary, think drane was second, voted for another #1 largely because of the genereal preference stated above

my number 1 isn't coming anywhere, sadly. it's a gescom track.

I don't know anyone who listened to them in the 90's who would say this.

hi

http://i.imgur.com/KARtlX7.jpg

9. Garbagemx - 178 points | 7 votes | 1 #1 vote

Baffling to me that "Garbagemx" outplaced "Bronchusevenmx," because the former takes FOREVER to get past the noodly bits before it gets interesting (which is the sparkly ambient sparkles that's otherwise in full effect in AeG).

(And yes, I lied, I have a few more images available right now.)

bronchus was my number 2. perhaps i should have made it number 1. Garbagemx is great but Vletrmx is better.

I can't listen to "Drane" on headphones, the clicks are too sharp, but it's almost worth it just to hear that glorious, skyscraping drone. And it's great on speakers.

idk about "attained sublimity" but i feel like it's common for longtime Autechre fans to believe they started doing something special and new with Confield, right?

xposts

they attained sublimit, y

Their 90's peak bought them almost limitless fan loyalty -- it came in handy for "Confield" and "Gantz Graf", which are a lot less immediate than what they'd done up to that point, IMO.

http://i.imgur.com/1UaWfeS.jpg

8. Pen Expers - 184 points | 8 votes | 1 #1 vote

http://i.imgur.com/dqrFOnc.jpg

7. Rae - 199 points | 9 votes

amazed myself by cutting this off my ballot at the last second (in favour of vi scose poise). it's really good though - just not one of my confield preferences. the ending as will have been pointed out is absurdly brilliant. the polyrhythms are pretty good fun. good organ sounds too. a criticism? feels a bit more up-front than some of their other stuff of the period - not as subtle, mysterious, buried, meditative, gorgeous* or contradictory - it's a fairly full-on assault, and it works

*the organ melody is lovely tho

uh, pen expers obv

rae i heard earlier and it was delightful & vv pretty and i won't hear a word said against it

cichli
parhelic triangle
arch carrier
cap.iv
eutow

PLUS ONE MORE

am now slightly doubtful about parhelic triangle? nah surely

rae is almost a str8-up ballad as well, w/o drane's mesmeric insectoid quality

"Rae" is so luscious despite working with the same gray-tone palette that the rest of the LP5 uses. It has the same low-contrast sumptuousness of The Passion of Joan of Arc. It's a neat trick how they do that.

And that really is it for now.

Final 6 tomorrow then?

I ~could~ post them in a few hours.

yeah thats enough for now, rae a plaintive whimsical lil bookend

imo wait for more ppl to be online tomorrow afternoon/evening, only fair

if you wanna sneak out #6 in a bit tho then by all means. i will be asleep

is eutow really that popular? i thought for sure I'd be the only one voting for it

Pen Expers was my #1. It just feels chaotic at first, then you have this beautiful melody slowly peeking through. Eventually the melody envelops the beat completely and somehow everything that seemed so random and chaotic at the beginning makes total sense. Then the melody disappears, but everything still seems perfectly structured and even though the melody isn't there anymore, its presence and effect on the rest of the song is still felt. It's a neat trick. A beautiful song.

eutow & c/pach were in my top 10... kinda wish they were treated as one song. I really don't like listening to one without the other.

also voted for

maphive 6.1 - more jazz! around four the minute mark it starts doing that mid 90s electro spy jazz thing, like early emissions-era two lone swordsmen. not sure how to describe the first two movements!

Anyone here for #6?

http://i.imgur.com/FH0tLE3.jpg

moar

Lee, have you ever wished for a 24-minute version of "444"?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZvVQKRaAa8

In a way you're right -- "444" could have been recorded by just about anyone on R&S' roster at the time -- but that's kind of the point. It's a stab at vaguely club-ready trance-y techno that they never attempted before or since, and that's what makes it special.

The skittery beats are pure 1993-style Autechre though, that just about nobody would have attempted on a track like this. And dare I say that the rapid-fire pseudo-hihats, strange bird-chirping rhythms, and wet blanket kick drum make up one of the funkiest rhythm tracks they ever recorded?

Barry, yes, I've seen the extended 444! Have to find the time to give it the proper attention though.

The rest will have to wait for tomorrow.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--2n_GV3oO6k/UQ5JpndfWUI/AAAAAAAAJHc/QC5d_LiaWnk/s1600/best-cry-ever.gif

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf1pJ-7GNV8

Not sure this compilation track was mentioned in the first thread - did anyone have this on their ballot? Love this one.