SWEET EXORCIST
RetroActivity
WARP218
Warp Records 2011
23 Tracks. 151mins24secs

 Amazon UK: CD | DLD US: CD Boomkat: CD | DLD iTunes: DLD

‘If everything is ready from the dark side of the moon, play the five tones’. This sample from Close Encounter Of The Third Kind is a very familiar attribute to any self-respecting early British techno fan for being one of the defining features of Sweet Exorcist’s debut EP, Testone, Warp’s third EP, released in January 1990.

Two years ago, Warp celebrated its twentieth anniversary in fanfare with a rather splendid box set, a set of compilations and a string of events across the world. Although Sweet Exorcist were noticeably absent of these celebratory publications, Warp have put a double album together to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the release of Clonks Coming, the label’s very first album, originally published in early 1991. Continue Reading »

Richard H. Kirk was already a legendary figure on the electronic scene when he teamed up with DJ  Parrot, then one of the main DJs at Sheffield’s club Jive Turkey, to form Sweet Exorcist, and recorded a series of minimalist techno records which were released on a fledgling label called Warp. The following album, Clonks Coming, was to be the first album released by the label. Twenty years on, to celebrate this momentous event, Warp have collected the album and EPs into a double album. Here, we catch up with Richard H. Kirk and look back at the whole Sweet Exorcist story, from how the pair got acquainted to working with Warp and becoming part of the label’s legend. Continue Reading »

RUSTIE
Glass Swords
WARP217
Warp Records 2011
13 Tracks. 42mins14secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP | DLD US: CD | LP | DLD Boomkat: CD | LP | DLD iTunes: DLD Spotify: STRM

Hailing from Glasgow where he’s slowly been imposing his sound alongside the likes of Hudson Mohawke and the Numbers collective, Rustie landed on Warp last year on the back of a fistful of EPs released since 2007. His first EP for the label, Sunburst, was published just over a year ago and received wide critical acclaim, instantly placing Russell Whyte, as he was christened, alongside the like of Warp non-conformists à la Aphex or Clark.

Glitzy, playful and in yer face, Glass Swords is a thrilling machine indeed. Caught up between bleepy video game soundtrack, futuristic R&B, bombastic eighties electro-pop and E’d-up rave, Rustie heads this roller-coaster of an album with the brazen presumption of a maverick on a rampage. Continue Reading »

AFRICA HITECH
93 Million Miles
WARPCD199
Warp Records 2011
11 Tracks. 58mins19secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP | DLD US: CD | LP | DLD Boomkat: CD | LP | DLD iTunes: DLD Spotify: STRM

Africa Hitech dropped a substantial first EP of broken dubstep and hip-hop-infused grooves just over a year ago, setting the hype machine in full swing in the process. The project of Mark Pritchard (of Global Communication/Jedi Knights/Harmonic 313 fame) and Steve ‘Spacek’ White, the idea of Africa Hitech came out of a desire to blend Detroit techno, soul and Jamaican dancehall. This was first synthesized into the razor-sharp urban textures of Blen, which was followed a few weeks later by an even more hard-hitting second offering, Hitecherous.

Fast-forward a year, and 93 Million Miles takes the pair’s original template and expands it to full length format. Continue Reading »

AUTECHRE
EPS 1991-2002
WARPCD211
Warp Records 2011
47 Tracks. 339mins59secs

Amazon UK: CD US: CD iTunes: DLD

For years, Autechre alternated albums and EPs with extreme regularity, the latter often acting as experimental playgrounds for Sean Booth and Rob Brown to try out new ideas. This release documents the first ten years of the band, from their very first, pre-Warp, outting to Gantz Graf. While Autechre have continued to release occasional EPs after that, they have been less prolific with that format in recent years, only two, Quaristice.Quadrange and Move Of Ten, having materialised, the former solely made available as a digital release, both counting too many tracks to be considered proper EPs. Continue Reading »

At the beginning of the nineties, Seefeel, originally formed of Mark Clifford, Sarah Peacock, Justin Fletcher and Mark Van Hoen, who was later replaced with Darren Seymour, found themselves treading the boundary between shoegaze, then in its dying days, and the rising electronica movement, releasing three seminal albums and a handful of EPs between 1993 and 1996. Then, although the four never officially split up, Seefeel was put on an indefinite hold. Now back, with two new members, a new album and a forthcoming tour, we took the opportunity to speak with Mark Clifford and Sarah Peacock about the very idea of Seefeel, their renewed focus and what may be the beginning of a new era for the band.

Continue Reading »

It’s been fifteen years since Seefeel last released a record, and even longer since they stopped performing live. The band returned to the stage at the end of 2008 for a unique live performance as part of the Warp20 celebrations in Paris. Prompted by an enthusiastic reception from Warp honcho Steve Beckett, Mark Clifford and Sarah Peacock, now with new members Shigeru Ishihara and Ilda Kazuhisa, got back in the studio and began working on new songs. The result first materialised with Faults last year, then with a self-titled album, both showing a band experimenting with much rawer and angular forms. Coinciding with the release of this fourth album, the band played a headlining performance at Kings Place, ahead of a series of live dates which will take them through the UK, Europe and beyond in the coming months. Continue Reading »

SEEFEEL
Seefeel
WARP205
Warp Records 2011
09 Tracks. 51mins35secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP | DLD US: CD | LP | DLD Boomkat: CD | DLD iTunes: DLD

Fourteen years on from their last album, and with two new members on board, the return of one of the most highly regarded bands of the early nineties is something of a major event. Seefeel never actually split up, but its members had, since the release of (Ch-Vox) on Rephlex back in 1996, focused on various projects and appeared to have drifted apart in such a way that it seemed totally unimaginable to see them working together again. It is the release of an expanded version of Seefeel’s seminal debut album, Quique, by Too Pure in 2007 which brought Mark Clifford and Sarah Peacock back talking. Since, the band, now counting Shigery Ishihara, better known as DJ Scotch Egg, and Ilda ‘E-Da’ Kazuhisa, have performed a handful of live dates, including one in Paris as part of the Warp20 celebrations, and returned in September last year with a brand new EP, Faults, now followed by this new album.

One of the prerequisites of the band ever recording again was always to create something different from anything they had done before. Continue Reading »

BRIAN ENO
Small Craft On A Milk Sea
WARPCD207
Warp Records 2010
15 Tracks. 48mins56secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP/CD BOX | DLD US: CD | LP/CD BOX | DLD Boomkat: CD | DLD iTunes: DLD

Musician, producer, composer… there is little Brian Eno hasn’t tried his hand at. For his latest album, his first for Warp, he has teamed up once again with regular collaborators Jon Hopkins, with whom he had most notably previously worked with on his 2005 album And Then So Clear, and guitarist Leo Abrahams, who has appeared on a number of Eno’s records in the last ten years, to create an album which, like many of his previous work, is inspired in part by film soundtracks.

As one of the pioneers of electronic music, and one of the most influential musicians of his generation, it seems quite fitting that Eno is making an appearance on Warp, a label which has over the years channelled many of Eno’s followers and has, in its own right, been a vehicle for many defining electronic artists of the last twenty years. Continue Reading »

SQUAREPUSHER
Squarepusher Presents Shobaleader One: d’Demonstrator
WARP196
Warp Records 2010
09 Tracks. 44mins40secs

Amazon UK: CD | LP | DLD US: CD | LP | DLD Boomkat: CD | LP | DLD iTunes: DLD

Do you know Squarepusher? This is what Tom Jenkinson was cheekily asking almost ten years ago, and he’s since regularly deflected preconceptions on his work, which resulted most spectacularly last year with the release of the superb Solo Electric Bass 1 album, which, as its title indicated, stripped his music back down to its most basic component, Jenkinson’s electric bass. With this new album, he moves the goal post once again away from the concussed drill’n'bass playground that he has made his over the years.

This latest affair started when a bunch of kids got in touch with Jenkinson with the prospect of bringing the fictitious band he had dreamt about, which subsequently led to Just A Souvenir two years ago, to life. Continue Reading »

Despite having only released one album and a couple of singles for the label, Seefeel are one of Warp’s most emblematic acts. Over a year ago, the band was resurrected, the time, it seemed, of a celebratory set as part of the opening event for Warp’s twentieth anniversary bash in Paris. That was without counting on the persuasive powers of Warp co-founder and head, Steve Beckett, who got on the band’s case and convinced them to work together again and finally give a follow up to the stunning and seminal Quique, Succour and (Ch-Vox), the band’s three albums to date.

The reunion actually dates back to 2007, when Mark Clifford and Sarah Peacock found themselves answering questions about the freshly expanded Quique, reissued by Too Pure. Continue Reading »

SEEFEEL
Faults
WAP299
Warp Records 2010
04 Tracks. 18mins59secs
Format: 10″/Digital

Amazon UK: 10″ | DLD US: DLD Boomkat: DLD

While Seefeel never officially split up, the project has been lying dormant for well over a decade. The band, was originally formed of Mark Clifford (guitar and programming), Sarah Peacock (guitar and vocals), Mark Van Hoen (bass) and Justin Fletcher (drums), until Van Hoen was replaced with Daren Seymour in 1992. Seefeel evolved on the fringe of shoegaze and were for a while closely associated with the Cocteau Twins, with whom they toured, yet their approach relied increasingly on heavily processed guitars and abstract ambient soundscapes which earned them considerable respect in electronica circles. In the space of three albums and a handful of EPs, released on Too Pure, Warp and Rephlex, they established a sound which remains to this day highly influential and totally unique. Following the release of their third album, (Ch-Vox) on Rephlex in 1996, Clifford concentrated on solo projects Disjecta and Wodenspoon, and collaborative efforts with Simon Kelaoha, better known as Calika, vocalist Sophie Hinkley as part of Sneakster, and more recently with Mira Calix, while Peacock, Seymour and Fletcher went on to form Scala. Clifford and Peacock were reunited three years ago as Too Pure issued an expanded version of the band’s 1993 debut album, Quique, and the idea of working together again slowly began to emerge. Continue Reading »