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There's loads of reasons to hate him, but TBH his music is pretty good, not my cup of tea, but hes clearly very talented. As for the Eno apostasy - his last album was amazing.

Beautiful.

Absolutely, seeing someone engage sincerely with something that is clearly completely alien to them and expressing their feelings so clearly is... good actually?

Oh yeah, Im well aware of NK's long history of espionage, but I was thinking of the constant surveillance of NK by UC spy planes and satellites, the time honoured deployment of CIA spies with weapons inspectors and the more recent sabotage of NK missile tests by the US. Yes, I agree that if NK had spent less on defence they would have had more money for everything else, that's precisely my point. Whatever about the appalling internal policies of the country, they have had a real and legitimate fear, articulated repeatedly by the US of total atomic annihilation. The events leading up to the war are complex, but I don't think there's any serious commentator who claims that political repression in the South was not a major factor. At least 30,000 dead at Jeju, hardline crackdowns of labour movements and protests, the 1948 election mired in violence, murder and boycotts, and ofc Rhee was responsible for the deaths of at least 200,000 between 1948 and 1954, the victims of massacre and political murder, which is strong indication of the character of his regime. It is in this context that the invasion took place, as the North (rightfully) viewed the south as a client state of a foreign power that was hellbent on opposing anything other than the most modest of socialist and political reform, which, as elsewhere in Asia, was wildly popular amongst the population. For the North (as with Vietnam) it was seen as a war of liberation against another set of colonial invaders and their quislings. That said, ofc I don't think the SK right wanted war, but I do think it fits very well historically into the US mode of operation.

I appreciate the reasoned response, but I think you are overlooking something critical. Constant attack does not necessarily have to come in military form. It can come as sanctions, economic pressure, espionage, sabotage, or even the threat of attack, which can often, in of itself massively distort economies, as Im sure youre aware as NK currently spends about 25% of its annual budget on the military. I don't particularly want to get in the intricacies of post-colonial asian geo-politics, but the only way this would seem vaguely plausible is if you completely ignore what happened in the years prior to each war, which in both cases were preceded by endless broken pledges by the US and its clients, manipulated or cancelled elections and labour crackdowns, state terror and massacres like the Jeju uprising. The US wanted to eliminate socialism in Asia and fold the region into a US dominated economic order and did everything they could to achieve this aim, including the escalation of atrocities to provoke military responses, at which point they would annihilate their opponents. Korea was in this sense a test run for Vietnam. I honestly would have thought this was uncontroversial at this point.

OK, so you know your stuff, but to claim so glibly that SK and NK both 'started from the same place', whilst ignoring the unimaginable, genocidal destruction wreaked on the North and then the most profound impact on the economy the dissolution of the Soviet Union - seems remarkably disingenuous, I mean, how precisely could NK have '80% of the peninsula's heavy industry' when virtually every single target in NK was destroyed by US bombing? If you have read Cummings you will know just how devastating the bombing campaign was. Even as you acknowledge the complexity of the issue you then dismiss the disastrous 1997 recession as a 'hiccup', ignoring the gargantuan structural problems at the heart of SK's capitalist economy that caused the recession. The problem with every critique of left economies is that it ignores an indisputable historical fact. From Russia, to Chile, Vietnam and the Congo, virtually every single state that seriously attempted to adopt communist or socialist economic models was either smothered in its cradle or attacked with such overwhelming force that it faced total destruction. You cannot assess the economic validity or potential of any group or organisation if they are subject to constant attack and undermining by vastly more powerful opponents, it would be like asking you to complete your tax return and plan your finances whilst someone burns your house down and beats you to a pulp.

Im sorry but this is completely insane, NK & SK did not start from the 'same economic/industrialised base'. In the Korean war, more bombs were dropped than in the entire pacific theatre of WWII. Virtually every single structure in north Korea larger than a hut was bombed or burnt out of existence, with up to 90% of North Korean cities destroyed, millions killed and the entire country essentially moved underground, a campaign that has been creditably described as genocidal. Despite this, NK somehow managed to rebuild the county in an unprecedentedly swift modernisation and the conventional wisdom is that per capita income in North Korea exceeded that of South Korea well into the 1970s. Indeed as well as being governed by a succession of military juntas, SK was considered an economic basket case for decades after the war despite significant US investment and support and their integration in the US dominated asian economic sphere. The decline of NK since has as much to do with the fall of the soviets as mismanagement due to central planning, and there are a multitude of other historical, economic and political factors which have led to this situation, most notably the continued refusal of the US to enter in detente despite numerous attempts by successive SK and NK administrations, and indeed historically high support for unification amongst South Koreans. You guys really need to read some history.

A beautiful soul. RIP.

One of the most entertaining and insightful AE reviews Ive ever come across.

OP, please stop thinking about music this way, all it will do is limit your enjoyment of one of the greatest gifts we have. The only thing that matters about music is if it makes you feel something. Everything else is bullshit.

Yeah, its the other mix on the 12". Underrated.

I dont normally do this, but I got sent a promo of this and immediately thought of WATMM. https://machinerecords.bandcamp.com/album/coordinates-ep

This seems very wrong. They are his best tunes; Lichen, Rhubarb, Quino-Phec, Blue Calx, Red Calx, Pancake Lizard, Waxen Pith, Zeroes and Ones, Stone in Focus... There's an entire canon of masterfully melancholy Aphex.

He may have been there too, but I remember some mangler jumping onstage as well. The chillage idiots mentioned it on their show afterwards, I heard a recording of it a couple of years back.

The 'bearded dancer' was some rando from the crowd who made it onstage IIRC. I don't remember any SAW II, I think he played the acid version of heliosphan. IIRC Railway Raver was excellent in support.

That Olympia gig was probably the best Aphex show Ive been too.

lol, yeah, its being caused by the the unmitigated and rampant spread of covid. We've known since 2020 that infection can cause a delayed acute reaction resulting in cardiac problems, strokes etc. and we've seen about an average of 8% excess deaths across the west this year. We've known that covid can damage the immune system since 2020 and now we're seeing widespread immune dysregulation resulting in an onslaught of hospitalisations for illnesses that are normally relatively harmless. Vaccine damage is a real thing, its undeniable, but its a minor issue compared to the suffering and chaos being caused by allowing a deadly bat-virus to spread unchecked through society.

Its difficult to overstate how hard it was to find out about stuff back then. I used to collect label phone numbers and ring them to try and get records.

Picked up SAW 1 in 93. Didn't really know anything about the wider scene. Heard Polygon Window and AI 1 around the same time but didn't have any real grasp of what WARP was. I think the first non-aphex WARP I bought was Virtual State by Richard H Kirk. Id heard of Autechre but I just thought they were pale Aphex imitations. It was probably late 94/95 when I was getting into jungle and heard amber and then tri repetae and anti in early morning after parties and realised how good they were.

Wow. Oddly enough the only tune Ive ever found a good mix for with Subterraneans was an Alva Noto track.

Nah, its open access now, and its way better value than Dall-E or stable diffusion. Pay $30 a month and you get unlimited slow time and 15 hours fast time, plus you have access to all the midjpurney models and their two x stable diffusion based models. the only things missing are in/out-painting and init image. I often generate stuff in MJ and then outpaint in Dall-E, which works pretty well once the style is dialled in. https://www.midjourney.com/ It can get a bit confusing with all the options, but its by far the best option. Hit me up if you get stuck with anything.

If you wanna do comics you should ditch Dall-E and try out Midjourney V4. I pretty much only use Dall-E for outpainting now.

That Romance LP is nice, we played it on the show in March.