Autechre
Tri Repetae++

Essential History of Electronic Music

XIII. Music for Tired Automatons

We had left off with the practice. The danceable techno of Detroit, the European resurgence of disco dance, the rave parties of the Earth's bowels. We remained near youthful delirium, dodging the globular lightning of the electroacid army of the new musical trend of the '90s: in the turbid river carrying the wooden pylons of dance electronics, the only escape route is stasis.

In 1989, thanks to two British producers, Steve Beckett and Robert Mitchell, Warp Records was born, a music label aimed at collecting pioneering electronic initiatives from the emerging scene. The trademark is quickly marked by the Artificial Intelligence series, a succession of albums from the early '90s where new experimental electronic artists offer valuable and original personal contributions: the stigma is the conception of electronic music for listening, a sort of rediscovery of the experimental lesson of Stockhausen and Varese. On the cover of the first volume of the series is thus a robot reclining on an armchair listening to "intelligent techno," the Kraftwerkian automaton satisfied with schematized dance, rediscovers the self-referential value of electronic music. Aphex Twin, Blackdog, Autechre, Speedy J, Alex Paterson are some of the authors who take part in the project: their contributions define music generally based on odd times, indulgent towards ambient and drone, often falsely danceable, rarely emotionally charged. "Intelligent Dance Music" (IDM) is the generic label given to the production of this genre, with the intention to clearly distance itself from the danceable and vulgar dance of the ballrooms, a targeted result of an experimental study on new solutions for '90s electronics.

The admirable example of the new "intelligent techno" is the monolith Tri Repetae by the British duo Autechre, true pioneers of the '90s electronic avant-garde and cultured executors of the new Warp Records poetics. A veritable treatise on listening electronics, a long sequence of beats, screeches, and booming magma able to establish the new physical perimeter of intelligent dance, limited to the sole diameter of the circle inscribed by the listener's soles. The directive is clear from "Dael," where the discharge of dissonant rhythms accompanies a nervous and minimal repetition of a melodic cell: the rhythmic fabric constrains the harmonic element throughout the piece, forging the concept of non-danceability. "Clipper" proceeds along the same lines, with a sequence of stinging roars supported by a Babel of metallic noises, concluding the logical discourse started by "Dael." The first reason for surprise comes with "Leterel," when a slow and monumental riff molded by synthesizers overpowers the usual Autechrean rhythmic friction for almost the entire piece: the content is imposing, here and there melodramatic, almost as if the emotive minimal techno expression of Moby had crossed paths with the British duo and imposed its pathetic stride. After the usual telluric entanglement in "Rotar," the long "Stud" triggers a trance setting à la Aphex Twin, a dilated sound stream in which, in a new scenario where chaotic beats are replaced by a liquid cosmic background radiation, the labyrinthine repetition of the same hinted musical cell gives no room for emotional interpretation, confirming the same principles of "Dael" and "Clipper." A new symphonic jolt with "Eutow" and then the last sheer fraction of the album: "C-Pach" is a triumph of melodic dissonances in a jungle of atonal beats, while "Gnit" seems unwilling to hint at even a minimal conceptual variation throughout its entirety. "Overand" exacerbates the concept of non-danceability, stripping "Stud" of rhythmic frills and reducing its essence to an ambient framework à la Eno, the final deaf and lascivious episode of the album. The finale dictated by the long, insistent keyboard sequence of "Rsdio" is a significant compendium of Autechrean poetics.

For genre enthusiasts, the American version Tri Repetae++ includes two long EPs supporting the work: Garbage and Anvil Vapre, works of pure experimentation partially close to the monoblock of Tri Repetae. Garbage, with a more familiar mood, includes the long and structured "Garbagemx36," the tribal diversions of "Piobmx19" and "Bronchusevenmx24," and the singular ambient sequence of "Vietrmx21," which refers back to "Leterel," presented in the form of an Enian watercolor for film music. Anvil Vapre, a few months later, seems to already herald a new course: in an atmosphere of total uncertainty from which only partially "Second Bad Vilbel" tries to escape, atonal and chaotic screeching dominates, almost as if a new completely amelodic musical theory based on dissonances had been implicitly postulated.

Warp Records will continue to follow the steps of the British duo, while simultaneously confirming the attractive sensations of artists the caliber of Aphex Twin, Plaid, Squarepusher. Since the '90s, electronic music has changed: in the naive itch of the ballroom, some pretended not to notice, but in the era of glitch and the eleventh dimension, man is a lone robot slumped over in an armchair.

If you didn't like this review you can wait for the next chapter or go back and make another choice!