Squarepusher
Do You Know Squarepusher

LA RECENSIONE

Love.
Love understood as a universal feeling, Love understood as what an artist has towards their own audience and towards themselves.
Renewing while maintaining their style, experimentation while respecting what the listener's ear wants to hear.

The more you love Squarepusher, the more he will love you. And in this album, he has loved himself quite a bit.
I don't know if you've noticed, but this album is rather bizarre. Starting with the first thing that catches our eye: it's a double album. Never before had the Welsh composer given us the satisfaction of a 2 CD; even stranger is that the first is an album of unreleased tracks, the second a live recorded at the Fuji Rock Festival 2001 and renamed "Alive in Japan".
I listen to the first album a couple of times one evening with my MP3 in the dark. We immediately notice an exaggerated use of words, actual lyrics, and vocal samples we were not at all accustomed to (with the exception of "My Red Hot Car"). Here's one of those oddities I mentioned earlier.
Starting in order, we immediately listen to the title track and although it has the d'n'b tempo, we do not notice a reckless use of odd times or machine-gun kicks/snare/cymbals, but rather repeat and reverse effects, all seasoned with a theme of sweet keyboards and a similar-rap (something you've already heard?). Not a bad start, anyway. Very "airy".

The following "F-Train" presents even darker sounds, a rap lyric, and a base underneath that, in its rhythmic stride, sometimes seems to "skip", like an old worn-out cassette tape. Not a bad idea.
We move on to "Kill Robok", which presents us with metallic-robotic samples (perhaps that's why the title? Who knows what they mean...), but it remains a break episode.
"Anstromm Feck-4" catapults us directly back to d'n'b sounds with bpm slightly above average and the underlying base sounds electronic. I suspect he used his multi-effected bass to make it. A danceable track to animate his raves with something of immediate impact.
"Conc 2 Symmetriac" reminds me of one of those movies where the protagonist has undergone experiments on his body, had his memory erased, and he tries to remember what happened to him through flashbacks. Almost a post alien abduction.

We arrive at "Mutilon Colony". The best track. 10 minutes of LSD-laden delirium. I don't know if Tom uses it, but there's a strong impact from the substance here. The first 3 minutes sound like a symphony for organ (yes, I consider the organ a very lysergic instrument). Almost like an intro for the most absolute experimentation. Featuring cymbals and gongs and pieces of metal, all masterfully effected. Of course, a surprise ending.
"Love Will Tear Us Apart" offers us another oddity: it's a cover. I'll leave it to you to judge, I really don't get involved with covers because I really don't know Joy Division.
In conclusion: something more unusual for our Tom, this has never been heard before, and all this may be pleasant to more open minds, or it may prove more disastrous for the more conservative ones. Truly an "ambiguous" album. Rating: 7, but as it can be a rating higher, it could be two less.

Regarding "Alive in Japan": live album as already mentioned, interesting setlist but recording leaves much to be desired.