The title track of this EP continues in the brutalising, complicatedstyle of 'Confield', which has caused such polarization in the Autechrefan base. Booth and Brown have earned the freedom at this point intheir career to lay down sheer digital noise if they want to, and tosee it consumed in numbers that must far exceed even flagship MEGOreleases. And, like their work on 'Confield', "Gantz_graf" is anauthoritative track that hammers and screams with pure digital flavours.Those uncomfortable with the possibility that they're hearing "curated"generative work will be disappointed with the title track—but to ignorethis release would mean missing out on two much more traditional,structured tracks which will certainly appeal to fans of their earlierreleases. The high-speed "Dial." beats out constantly evasive drumpatterns, with myriad pads bleeping their way through their own equallybewildering sequences. A segue into "Cap.IV", and we're treated to morechunky percussive wizardry and a trademark Ae chord progression whichcontests, towards the track's end, with unintelligibly fast sequenceblurs. Fans will be happy.
Warp pulled out the stops by issuing a special version of the EPcontaining both the music CD, and a DVD, for approximately twice theprice of the CD. (Thankfully they opted to package it in a double-depthjewel case rather than in oversized DVD packaging.)
Alexander Rutterford's video for "Gantz_graf" synchronizes thehigh-speed mutations of an abstract, jagged, and, well, futuristic CGIobject with the music of the titular track. Very impressive. There'salso a slide show from the video—a nice addition since the images flashby so quickly. Chris Cunningham's famous "Second Bad Vilbel" video wasan early taste of the robotic imagery exploited in Bjork's "All Is FullOf Love", with an insectoid robot cavorting about in menacing fashion,seen through security camera visuals. It's had a nice facelift that hasadded more musical synchronization, and has got rid of the dodgy aliencreature which spoiled the original. The "Basscadet" video, which Ihadn't seen before, hasn't stood the test of time as well asCunningham's, using as it does the same CGI technology as all thosepo-faced X-Mix collections full of bad ambient techno videos thateveryone seemed to be buying in the early to mid nineties. It's not badgiven all that, and certainly avoids the hippy rubbish seen in mostvideos of that era.
In sum, no-one would be well advised to rush out to buy a DVD playerfor this, but if you have access to one, it's worthwhile—especially ifyou haven't seen Cunningham's excellent video before.
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