Carbon Based Lifeforms - World Of Sleepers

Ultimae: 2006/2011

I love Carbon Based Lifeforms. Adore their ambient grace, their manipulations with little TB-303 knobs, their sense of open spaces both outer and inner. And yet, even after a half-decade of nabbing a copy of World Of Sleepers (thanks, re-issues!), it's never quite clicked for me the same way all their other records have. Heck, despite hearing Interloper for the first time just this year, it stuck with me stronger than most music off here. Right, that album was almost blatantly immediate and obvious in its songcraft, but Twentythree was pure synth-pad drone, and even that's taken more residence in my brain-pan than World Of Sleepers. Believe you me, it's getting ever more crowded up there, though I get the sense a little memory degradation has set in. Like, I can only recall about three out of fifteen tracks from 1993's D.J. Club Mix Vol. 2 from Polytel, one of which being a lame cover of Mr. Vain by 'Club Beat'. Oh dear, I'm doing that old man thing of ridiculously long anecdotal tangents, aren't I.

Naturally, this isn't a problem when I'm playing CBL's sophomore album. After the slow, gradual build of opener Abiogenesis, where soft ambient pads, ethereal tones, bleepy electronics, and digital voices guide your synapses to 'wake up', you're damn skippy my body's ready for the thumping beats and burbling acid after. If there was any doubt that Misters Segerstad and Hedberg weren't worthy of being mentioned in the same breath as Ultimae's other key acts of the time (Solar Fields, Aes Dana, Asura), that opener should have quelled them.

And World Of Sleepers doesn't let down from there, follow-up Vortex a haunting piece of ambient techno once again playing to CBL's strengths (dubby pads, acid!), and Photosynthesis working another wonderful builder containing a melody that's on par with the classic MOS 6581. Three tracks, three winners! But after that, World Of Sleepers starts losing me.

The music remains all fine in of itself, it just feels as though CBL are retreading similar ideas already explored in the openers. More burbling acid, more lovely synths, more dubby percussion, more filtered 'science' lyrics, all of which kinda' blends together as World Of Sleepers plays through. Yet when I hear the crunchy acid work from Proton/Electron, the soft chill-out of Gryning, the gentle piano tones of the titular cut, or the geek-hop rhythms of Erratic Patterns out of context, I always do a double-take of “whoa, why haven't I heard this CBL track before?” I have, every time I've thrown World Of Sleepers on for a playthrough and unconsciously let it slip into the background of my attention span. Why does my brain keep doing that!?

The final track of Betula Pendula does draw me back in though, a gorgeous ten-minute piece of space ambient. Always gives me the uber-feels after, which keeps World Of Sleepers high on my 'Great Ultimae Albums' list. Why yes this 'list' is ridiculously big, why do you ask?

King Midas Sound - Without You

Hyperdub: 2011

How odd is it that this Kevin Martin project immediately got a remix album, but none of his Bug material has. Even the critically lauded London Zoo only got a few token EP rubs, and that was undoubtedly his most successful album ever. King Midas Sound, on the other hand, passed by with less buzz, quite a few folks not even aware it was another project from The Bug. Still, I sense it gained something of a 'musician's musician' following, where the savviest of UK Bass ears couldn't help but zero in on King Midas Sound's developments. I doubt Martin, Roger Robinson, and Kiki Hitomi planned it as such, but when I see a crap-ton of obscure, esoteric artists 'reworking' tunes for Without You, it makes me wonder exactly who's the target audience here. Like, were so many acts anxious to lend their aesthetic to the King Midas sound that Hyperdub had no choice but to release a remix album like this?

Actually, Without You is something of a mish-mash of older stuff and new material. If you missed out on the King Midas Sound debut record Cool Out, fret not for you get the wonk-jazz of Flying Lotus' rub on Lost (eh, I'll pass) and Dabrye's weirdo synth-pop stab at One Ting as a hidden track (noice!). Both remixes on the Goodbye Girl single also show up, Without You kicking off with Kuedo's ker-lumpity bass-clump of G.G., plus Mala's tribal dubstep of Earth A Kill Ya. It ain't bad, but compare it to the bizarre place art-poppers Gang Gang Dance take the original moody number - I'm left speechless! The original was a fairly minimalist, menacing piece of spoken word dub music, whereas Gang Gang turn it into something you might expect from an Orb and Youth collaboration: all chipper, flighty, and filled with silly sounds. And yet Roger's words remain just as poignant in this setting as the other. How'd Gang Gang do d'at?

All the new songs are given 'revoice' credits, including the titular cut with a D-Bridge rub that's almost ambient dub. Kiki gets to showcase a little Japanese knowledge with Tears, Cooly G brings some R&B sultriness to the fray in Spin Me Around, and Joel Ford does his own croon in Say Somethin'. Not to let all these urban voices dominate, Green Gartside of the indie band Scritti Politti shows up in Come And Behold. It's... an odd contrast to the rest of Without You's thick haze of grimy dub ol' Kevin drenches his productions in.

In case that's not enough, other remixes go for weird abstraction (Robert Aiki; Ras G & Afrikan Space Program; ooh Deep Chord!), or familiar Hyperdub future garage (hey Kode 9; yo' Hype Williams). In all, Without You is a warped trip through the disparate muses of various musicians, the only thing holding it together being Kevin Martin's faith in letting all those invited stretch wherever they want. Well no wonder so many wanted in on this 'remix' album!

Cryobiosis - Within Ruins

Cryo Chamber: 2013

Another day, another artist on the ever expanding Cryo Chamber roster. Seems I can't go a few months without talking about someone for the first time on this label. Heck, in a way, I've already covered nearly all of them in one of those Cryo Chamber Collaboration albums, but it seems I'm on an unconscious task to give Every. Single. Artist. on Simon Heath's print their own special spotlight too. Including this one, I've now talked up twenty-three artists with music on Cryo Chamber, and there's still a bunch more I've never mentioned (Aseptic Void, Dark Matter, Wordclock, Metatron Omega, Paleowolf, Hoshin, and more... oh God, are there ever more!). Is this dark ambient outlet becoming its own version of a black hole, seemingly sucking in all manner of musicians into its bleak gravity well? No, that can't be right – I've come across quite a few other labels with just as massive of contributors to their discographies. Cryo just has something that keeps me poking about more, wondering how this new name or that overlooked producer might offer a different spin on the genre's morbid aesthetics. Also, sweet, sweet CDs to buy. Gotta' have ma' physicals!

Cryobiosis isn't exactly new to the Cryo family, in fact one of Mr. Heath's earliest recruits to the Chamber house. Cristian Voicu first debuted with From The Depths on GV Sound, yet another dark ambient/drone/experimental net label that's harboured such talents as SiJ, Songs From A Tomb, Morbid Silence, Astral & Shit, Radio Noiseville, and... Primus? Uh, anyway, ol' Simon liked Mr. Voicu's voice enough to invite him over for an album deal. He's released two since then, Within Ruins the first of them. It's fairly easy to hear why the Cryobiosis stylee caught on with Mr. Atrium Carceri, both having an ear for those post-apocalyptic tones and atmosphere, exploring abandoned dwellings in decayed husks of civilization. It's just, going by this album, Cryobiosis doesn't quite have the same sense of narrative flow as Atrium Carceri does.

For sure his craftsmanship with each track is easily on par. Opener Enthrall has all the morbid drones, discordant pads, and skritchy sound-effects that have you feeling like your wandering the broken rubble of old buildings. Some tracks offer piano calm while fumbling through dripping ceilings and puddles of black water (Frigid Silence, Recollection, Forgotten). Others ramp up the claustrophobic field-recordings and forlorn tone (The Corridors Beneath, Corroded, As The World Decays, Departure). And some pieces are pure depressive drone as you wander aimlessly through the dark (Murkfall, Through Debris).

Where am I going with this though? What exactly am I seeing? Is there a story behind the scenery, or does it exist only for its own sake? There's merit in such an approach to the genre, but I cannot deny being spoiled by many Cryo Chamber releases crafting distinct stories guiding me through more than vivid, unrelated imagery. If that's all Cryobiosis set out to make though, then Within Ruins definitely succeeds there.

The Beatles - With The Beatles

Parlaphone: 1963/2009

The only Beatles album you're supposed to have, even if you're not a Beatles fan. It's got the iconic cover photo, after all, one even The B-Sharps ripped off. It's also the 'indie' option of their first two albums, lacking the instantly recognizable hit singles of Please Please Me, like I Saw Her Standing There, Love Me Do, and Lennon's famous throat-wrecking rendition of Twist And Shout. Instead, you get almost-as instantly recognizable hits like All My Loving, I Wanna Be Your Man, and Starr's tub-thump rendition of Please Mister Postman. Okay, they're both chocked full of vintage Beatlemania 'choons', but With The Beatles has the iconic cover and the slightly lesser-known classics, critical factors in building music hipster cred. Plus, it was the last album released before America caught on to their music, butchering their releases into nothing like the UK versions in the process. Basically, you'd be a true O.G. vinyl God if you had With The Beatles in America - or was Canadian. Yeah, my country got With The Beatles months before them yankees had any official music from the Liverpool-Four. Having ties to the Commonwealth was still reaping some benefits.

As always, it's nigh impossible for me to review an album that's been psychoanalyzed to death by music scribes nearly twice as old as I. The Beatles' story is so etched in Western culture that it'll likely last far into the future, when rock music is but a distant memory, but tales of troubadours conquering the globe endure. So it's rather quaint coming back to these early records when they were still mostly a British phenomenon, rockin' the billy, Merseying the beat, and coverin' the cross-Atlantic classics. No Bob Dylan folksy influences found here yet, my friends.

If you're wondering just how these lads managed to sell over a million copies of With The Beatles (a feat previously accomplished once in Britain, via the South Pacific soundtrack - haven't heard it either), it wasn't just their snappy duds and puckish charms. These guys really were good musicians, already finding ways of mixing things up as a record played through. Little Child has harmonica! Till There Was You has bongos! Please Mister Postman has cowbell! I Wanna Be Your Man has Ringo singing! And yes, it's the same song The Rolling Stones did too. Lennon and McCartney wrote the tune, then figured maybe Jagger and his band might have better use of it. Mickey and the Stoners definitely did, but then them Beatles went and did their own version of it anyway, each being released within weeks of the other. What's funny is Lennon figured the tune just a throw-away, because like Hell he'd give the Stones or Ringo the spotlight on a good song.

Even if you're just a fan of the Number-One hits, it's hard denying all the charming melodies and vocal harmonies throughout With The Beatles. These guys had the look, the sound, and the drive for something unprecedented in rock music: global domination.

Ladytron - Witching Hour

Island Records/Nettwerk: 2005/2011

Hard to believe this is only my second Ladytron review, but it's not like the foursome have made a ton of music over the years. To date, they've released five albums (though a sixth is in the works), their last one coming out way back in ye' olde year of 2011. I suppose that hectic touring schedule caused a bit of the ol' burn-out, plus they aren't the quirky young electro-pop chickens of the early '00s anymore. I'm sure members now have families to tend to, side-projects to cultivate, and whatever else that can keep a four-piece with as disparate backgrounds as these lads and lasses have from reuniting with consistency. Maybe that's why, for as much as I adore Ladytron's sound, I've always been hesitant in buying up their albums in one big splurge. I want to savour the ones that do come out for as long as humanely possible, never risking my own burn-out.

After yet another round of label troubles, Ladytron released their third album Witching Hour in 2005, one of the worst years for electronic music since the initial rave explosion. Fortunately, the group somehow stands outside time and space, the record just as sonically timeless as their previous work, yet also pertinent to the trends happening in the here (there) and now (then). It's a very good album, is what I'm saying, in a year when finding very good albums was a ridiculous feat of excavation that would make Indiana Jones and Globetrotting Batman quiver in the knees.

It was also a radical departure from the pure synth-heavy sound the group had in their early work, bringing in added drums and guitar work to complement their electro-pop. Some attributed it to latching onto the disco-punk wave of the time (LCD Soundsystem was the hippest band about), but I don't hear it. Rather, it simply sounds like Ladytron spent some of their hard-earned cash on new musical toys, thus letting them expand their aesthetic beyond pure retro work. Unless you figure 'post-punk new wave' just as retro as synth-pop.

It worked to some extent, Witching Hour scoring the band some of their first chart action, lead singles Destroy Everything You Touch and Sugar some of their best-selling songs. They weren't gang-busters, mind you, but considering their label troubles, it's remarkable they got on the Billboards at all. Then again, breaking the 'boards was never their M.O. I think their fans are perfectly content keeping Ladytron's impossibly earwormy choruses to themselves anyway. Saves room at the live shows.

And there's plenty more to enjoy from this album. The peppy 'rockers' (High Rise, AMTV, Weekend, Whitelightgenerator), the dreamy synth-poppers (International Dateline, Soft Power, The Last One Standing), and the moody downbeat pieces (CMYK, Beauty*2, All The Way). Throw in all the charmingly catchy, yet oddly tragic lyrics you've come to expect from Helen Marnie's satin lisp (...*swoon*), and Witching Hour remains one of Ladytron's best records. Just ignore the rubbish remixes at the end of the re-issues though.

Various - WipEout XL

Virgin: 1996

WipEout didn't introduce the world of gaming to electronic music, but it sure built one of the biggest, strongest bridges to its culture. The first game scored a coup in getting the legendary Designer's Republic to create its futuristic aesthetic, while Tim Wright of Psygnosis' music studio supplied several original techno and trance tracks that fit the vibe of racing at super-high speeds. It didn't hurt that a beta version of the game appeared in the 'raver' movie Hackers either.

Sensing they could do more nods to the burgeoning 'chemical generation', Psygnosis also licensed out a few tracks from prominent 'electronica' acts of the day, including Leftfield, The Chemical Brothers, and Orbital. This factoid wasn't seen as a major selling point for the game though, especially since the tracks never appeared on the American version of WipEout. When a sequel to the game was announced, however, the mighty Virgin realized they could license out a bunch of their signed acts to the game, giving them even greater exposure with a totally untapped gaming demographic. Throw in other 'rave culture' landmarks like Red Bull ads (when 'energy drinks' were still a new concept for the West) plus associated music videos, and you have one of the defining touchstones of 'electronica' in the '90s! Or just a fun racing game with kick-ass music.

I'm almost tempted to do two reviews of WipEout XL (aka: WipEout 2097), as the game version and soundtrack version do have differences. Most interestingly, the game features some ridiculously rare cuts from The Chemical Brothers and FSOL, not to mention the exclusive Cold Storage tunes from Mr. Wright. Maybe I'll save it for *gasp* video reviews.

As for the CD, the track list isn't too surprising if you know your mid-'90s 'electronica': We Have Explosive, Loops Of Fury, The Third Sequence, Afro Left, P.E.T.R.O.L., Firestarter, Atom Bomb. Actually, the Fluke single is somewhat different here, slower and with bigger beats than the video tie-in. Underworld is also repped, though by way of the ultra-fast, loopy Tin There (a sorta' remix of Pearl's Girl), and a remix of The Chem-Bros' Leave Home that somehow sounds nothing like either group.

Easily the most intriguing thing about this compilation are the two exclusive cuts that never appeared in either WipEout game: Source Direct's 2097 and Daft Punk's Musique. The former I can see either as a tune that didn't make into the game, or Photek getting his pals a little extra rub, being something of students of Mr. Parkes' approach to tech-step. That Daft Punk track though, it's totally a case of Virgin promoting one of their new acts. And why not, the French duo already making massive early buzz with their initial singles. Sure, Musique's “what if Plastikman did a house track?' vibe totally clashes with the rest of WipEout XL's roster of big beat, d'n'b, and Brit techno, but damn, feel that funky filtered low-end. Virgin's trick worked, as I couldn't wait to hear it on the forth-coming album!

Various - Winter Chill 2

Hed Kandi: 2000

Something funny happened in the year between the first Winter Chill and its inevitable sequel: chill-out music as a commercial juggernaut became a thing. For sure it's always had a marketable undercurrent within club culture, dating as far back as when The KLF specifically made an album to chill out to called Chill Out. Whether it be ambient dub, Balearic jazz, trippy hip-hop, or whatever trendy, laid-back vibe was currently circulating, mentally exhausted punters could always rely on a few selections in the music shops to ease their frazzled brains. Then someone in the high towers of record labels realized there were more folks out there who could use a little downtime music in their lives than the Ecstasy Generation, and chill-out compilations suddenly exploded upon the scene with several CDs featuring the same songs you already had in a different order. Sure as shit Hed Kandi wasn't immune to this trend.

Think I'm exaggerating? Second track on Winter Chill 2: Moby's Porcelain. Third track: Chicane's No Ordinary Morning. Fourth track: Delerium's Silence. Tenth track: Thievery Corporation's Lebanese Blonde. CD1 also features songs from Bent, Goldfrapp, Dusted, A Guy Called Gerald, and The Beloved. You getting a sense of familiarity yet? Hell, CD2 opens with Paul van Dyk's Vega! Yeah, it's a nice enough chill tune, Mr. Van Dyk having a stab at jazzstep, but these are all darn obvious names to have on a chill-out collection, even for the year 2000 when the concept still had a fresh fragrance. The series did course correct in later volumes, though Winter Chill itself only lasted six volumes before Hed Kandi was bought out by Ministry Of Sound, save a one-off return in 2012. You bet your bottom dollar its got nothing to do with 'chill-out' music!

Back to Winter Chill 2, even Hed Kandi head-man Mark Doyle knew including the likes of Moby, Delerium, and Paul van Dyk was little more than a shameless commercial tactic to lure in the impulse buy, and thus ignores such artists in his inlay notes. Instead, he once again big-ups his label's own talent like the jazzier Afterlife and Urban Dwellers, which is fair play if you're having them rub shoulders with chill-out's newest stars.

If all this 'suburban downtempo' music isn't cutting it for you, there's always CD2. Vega aside, this is where most of the trip-hop and acid jazz vibes are hiding out, many tracks care of the rising Studio K7! that Mr. Doyle was quite eager in hyping. Thus you find Tosca, Terranova, Smith & Mighty, Handsome Boy Modeling School (Dan The Automator!), and... LTJ Bukem? Well, he did have a debut album out that same year. And yeah, CD2 is definitely more of the downtempo vibe I prefer in compilations of this sort, with plenty of smooth, smokey rhythms, soulful strings, dubby atmosphere, and sultry vocals throughout. As a means of introducing music on a proper deep tip to soccer moms who bought this for Silence, I'd say Winter Chill 2 does right.

Various - Winter Chill

Hed Kandi: 1999

The nice thing about a lot of old Hed Kandi CDs is how cheap you can find them now – ironic, considering how pricey they were when fresh on store shelves. It was that ridiculously expensive entry point (especially as an import) that always made them an easy pass when pursuing the shops for new music, but I can't deny seeing that super-slick cover art would give me pause regardless. Now one can find these things for a quarter the original price, and sure, may as well take in a couple if I see an intriguing one in the used market. They did have a reputation for having good music as well, at least before being absorbed by Ministry Of Sound.

The label also built its rep' on deep house on a slightly commercial bent, but they were all about that downtempo vibe too, releasing at least two such compilations per year. Serve Chilled first came out in summer, and when that proved successful, Hed Kandi head-man Mark Doyle decided a winter companion just made good artistic sense (not to mention mighty profitable as a Xmas gift option). The basic idea behind Winter Chill, then, was music that was best played while cozying up indoors with a hot beverage as brisk winds and dour weather beat against your patio windows. And what better music to supply such a setting than good ol' trip-hop (mostly CD1) and acid jazz (mostly CD2), the most dependable (and commercially viable) of the downtempo genres.

Anyone worth their salt in this scene should know a tonne of artists in this tracklist. Nightmares On Wax. Mr. Scruff. The Herbaliser. Peshay. Rae & Christian. A Man Called Adam. Morcheeba. Innerzone Orchestra. Hell, this is looking like a Ninja Tune collection. Even d'n'b man Omni Trio can't help but stay jazzy-chill with Native Place. Smartly, Mr. Doyle mixes in a number of fresh faces and obscure acts too, letting names like Santessa, Eyedentity, 45 Dip, and Guardians Of Dalliance get a little associative rub from the main draws on a CD like this.

The most 'mainstream' names that crop up are Hybrid and The Wiseguys, but even then we're not dealing with well-known tunes from them. We get the trip-hop bounce of We Be The Crew provided by The Wiseguys, and the French-rapping cut Sinequanon from Hybrid. Wow, never would have thought I'd hear the same French-rap tune in such a short amount of time, especially when my exposure to French-rap is basically nil.

As for all the other recognizable names, I can't confirm or deny whether tracks like Survival, Pacific, So Long, The Sensual Woman, or Moog Island are obscure offerings from their respective creators, in that I don't actually have albums from them. Yeah, funny that, me having so much downtempo music, but almost all of it in compilation form. All I can confirm is I don't have many of these songs anywhere else, making Winter Chill an ace collection for rounding out my collection.

Various - Winter

Altar Records: 2017

Boy, was this one a long time coming. Even without my alphabetical stipulation, the fourth edition of Altar Records' Seasons series was quite late. The first one, Spring, was released way back in spring of 2013, over four years ago! Summer came a year later, then Fall in late autumn of 2015. Nothing too out of the ordinary there, having a yearly series with a release date coinciding with its particular thematic season. The whole year of 2016 went by though, with no Winter to be seen. We were assured Winter was coming though, so we waited, and waited, and waited, but still no dragons, just a bunch of floppy wieners- whoops, wrong 'winter'.

Finally, in late February of this year 2017, Winter was released. I guess that technically keeps it within its established schedule, but yeah, compared to the brisk rate of output from Altar Records' first thematic series, this one sure took its sweet time reaching completion. I mean, it's been so long, it's forgotten its original art-style. What happened to the border runes, and the seasonal kaleidoscope stylee? Sure, this cover art is purty as fresh fallen snow, but rather typical of Altar's usual fare. The others had a distinct flair unto themselves.

Whatever. It's always the tracks within that's important and label head DJ Zen still knows how to find 'em, sign 'em, licence 'em, arrange 'em, print 'em, distribute 'em, and- wait, where's the “mix 'em” in all that? What kind of DJ doesn't mix?

Familiar names that return naturally include AstroPilot, his The Wind Through The Keyhole as solid a slice of ethnic-flavoured psy-chill as anything he's ever put out. Long time Altar vets Lab's Cloud gives us a dubbier offering of psy-chill in Alma Zen, while Suduaya's Clear Water opts for a spritely bit of prog-psy (it's almost 'twinkle prog'!). Hm, both these acts have been Altar staples for a while, yet I haven't reviewed anything of theirs. May have to rectify that. Anyhow, the best of the star players is Asura's The Savers, one of the most energetic, gnarliest trance tunes I've heard Mr. Farewell kick out in ages. Holy cow, where has he been hiding this stuff!

A few newer recruits to the Altar family rounds Winter out. Argus gets two track to open the compilation with, The Time Before a pure ambient dub outing while We Are One dips into prog-psy's waters, as does Profondita's Island. At the opposite end, one half of that group, Eyal Markovich, remixes No Gravity from Unusual Cosmic Process into a throwback prog-psy outing - compared to the typically languid pace Altar loves promoting, it's 'uptempo prog-psy'!

Eh, you've noticed something lacking in these detailings? Yeah, cannot deny the 'winter' theme is rather absent in these tunes. For sure they're all great cuts, but they don't make me feel like I'm frolicking in frosty meadows or snow-capped forests. Maybe dark ambient truly is the best winter music out there.

Sounds From The Ground - Widerworld

Waveform Records: 2012

I relaunched this blog four years and eleven months ago. Can you guess how many Sounds From The Ground albums I had at the time? None. None of their albums is how many I had on October 2012. I barely even had two of their tracks, Triangle and Gather, the latter by way of an earlier Elliot Jones project called Path. Including this particular release, I now have eight of their albums. In that time since, Sounds From The Ground released a ten track, twenty year retrospective called 20 Years Of The Best. Naturally, most of those have been given an Ace Track honour (such prestige!), yet I could make a double-LP playlist of SFtG Ace Tracks alone. If you'd have told me I'd be a Sounds From The Ground 'expert' after five years of doing this, I'd have laughed at the notion I'd still be doing this five years later. Surely it'd only take a couple years to review my entire music collection, not a half-decade.

Sans that 'best of', Widerworld is thus far the last album Jones and Nick Woolfson released on Waveform Records, the duo having since gone with their own Upstream Records print for new music distribution. Maybe they'll return to Waveform at a later date, but three albums deep now in the independent domain, and I think they're quite satisfied with how Upstream's doing. Ooh, they even rolled out a vinyl option for their latest effort, Alchemy!

As for this particular album, I mentioned in their previous one, The Maze, that SFtG were showing signs of evolving their ambient dub sound. True, it was an achingly sluggish evolution, but the change was at least noticeable, making more use of modern dub production over the staunch traditionalist stuff most associate with '90s trip-hop. Widerworld carries that on, though as we're still dealing with Sounds From The Ground, the sonic development still moves forward at a glacial pace. Fans wouldn't have it any other way, I reckon.

What stood out the most for me on this album were the tracks that almost sounded like Jones and Woolfson were cribbing a little from other acts. Yeah, you could make that claim about a lot of their work – comparisons to Kruder & Dorfmeister are inevitable – but I'm talking outside the usual assortment of name-dropped downtempo producers.

For instance, the track Hunters utilizes a few dubbed-out sounds that have me recalling Future Sound Of London at their dubbiest. Raining Leaves has gentle synth pads and bloopy chill acid that wouldn't have sounded out of place on older Aphex Twin in his more whimsical moments. Fields Of Green And Yellow almost has a laid-back country vibe with its acoustic guitar work, but those additional synth notes in the back-half are pure Sounds From The Ground vibe. And Ink Spots... eh, there's probably some glitchy dubstep guy out there that I could compare to, but I'm lazy in confirming it.