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I've been meaning to make a topic to let all you British folks know that Plaid is featured on this month's issue (December 2019) of Computer Music magazine! I saw they retweeted the news on Twitter and scrambled to an ol British Newsstand website I used to buy the sadly defunct SpongeBob Magazine years back, Newsstand.co.uk. Very useful site if you're not living in the U.K and interested in seeing Plaid talk for a bit and show how they make Los with specific software, among a couple other features.


The magazine also shows a link to an awesome video with making Los too if you can't buy the magazine.

 

My copy came today and I peeked a bit through it. Will give it a full read later but I saw some news that caught my eye. Ed mentions a NEW EP coming by the end of November or so!!! I'm fuckin hyped, not only do we get Peel Session 2 but this too! Andy mentions it being "more pure dancey material".


I wish I can scan the 12-page feature but I sadly don't own a scanner and taking pictures on my sister's phones will take ages. XP

A new edit i put together with audio Luke shared in a 2003 interview showing a collaboration he did with Richard.

OK gang - what do we have here. Well we have the CW compilation CD filed under CAT 009 CD. AB3 (CAT 008) was released in 1993 but this one came out in 1998. They must have decided early on that there would be a compilation put out to collect those early CW 12"s. Those were some of the first Rephlex records out there and correct me if I'm wrong, but are Pop Corn and R2D2 the only tracks not included on this comp? They are good tracks and it's too bad they're not on here however I happen to love this CD. This compilation was also repressed as 3x12s" in 98 as well (although that one is missing the humanoid must not escape" -- tragic)

what to say. I love all these tracks. Another excellent showcase of early RDJ at his esoteric best. Tracks go all over the place stylistically but each one is so easily identifiable as an RDJ product. As far as early "compilations" go, I prefer this one to "Classics" - Cordialatron, Italic Eyeball, Astroblaster, On The Romance Tip and Humanoid Must Not Escape are so excellent. I don't know if these are as "club-ready" as Digeridoo or even Tamphex. Maybe this release sits between SOSW and Classics on headphone <--> dancefloor spectrum.

Won't say much more because we all know and love this one, and I wanna keep going to more "obscure" Rephlex releases. This one has even been reissued more than once!

In short.... It's great. 4/5.

Up next.... CAT 010 CD / Mike Dred The Kosmic Kommando - Freaquenseize 

The agency that created an interactive installation for the Collapse release did a walk through of how the project was created and executed. Pretty cool to see the design and tooling behind the scenes. RDJ had sent them samples to work with but apparently Warp thought it was "off brand" so it was changed out last minute to use clips from the Collapse songs.

 

"AFX in his third Analogue Bubblebath"

Well... What to say here.. I'll keep it short because I'm sure any and everything Aphex has been discussed thousands of times over on this site and elsewhere. The CD edition coming in early 1993 slightly after the 12" in 92, contained 5 extra tracks left off the original vinyl. These were later put to wax when they repressed AB3 in 1997. I'll get to one of those in a moment.

In the context of his entire oeuvre, I would say this is a pretty weak release for him, sounding like discarded scraps from SOSW and Caustic Window releases. Probably why it came out on "his" label. I still like them and they have an unmistakable aphexy-ness, but after making my way though the soundcloud dump I'm not totally clear as to why *these* tracks were selected. For serious heads only. Sound off in the comments.

There is one track on this CD however that i would rank as one of His Best Ever. I'm speaking of course of "(CAT 00897-AA1)"  which is a happy, uplifting piece of simple electronic music that only RDJ can come up with. It is a treasure and always puts me in a good mood. It's often on background playlists for when I have people over and it always gets "ooooh what is this?"

 

For this track alone the CD is worth it. It's a magical one. Another track I like is .1993841, a nice long moody groove. (CD only track #1) is also a nice "b-side" from SAW II perhaps. The rest I could probably do without. Anyone here absolutely love this release?
 

So.. AB3: 3/5

(CAT 00897-AA1): 5/5

 

Up next.... more RDJ with the Caustic Window Compilation CAT 009 CD 🙂