Collapsed. This is how we got this morning after listening to the first notes of the new Aphex Twin‘s release. From the beginning of August, the subway tunnels at London, New York, Turin, Los Angeles and Tokyo showed mysterious paintings that undoubtedly referred to the British producer. The message was clear: new music was on the way. Richard D. James is “the most influential artist of contemporary electronic music,” according to The Guardian, and productions like “Collapse” are there to back it up.
Aphex Twin is one of the greatest ambassadors of what is known as IDM (Intelligent Dance Music). He always laughs when asked about this concept. “Does that mean that other music is stupid?”, he asked in an interview. Here we will never say that other genres are stupid, but it is undeniable that Aphex Twin‘s sound is intelligent, sophisticated, highly elaborated. The music included in ‘T69 Collapse’ is relaxing, but it’s made up with accelerated fundamentals. It’s soft, but it includes very distorted high-pitched percussions. It has a friendly and appeased tone, but its melodies are psychedelic, bucolic and even somewhat dark, solitary. That is the Aphex Twin‘s greatness. He’s able to combine elements that walk in one direction to get the adverse effect as a result.
The video clip coming with these new sounds also plays with distortions and with the navigation of the spectator through binary code. We find that same vintage look at his website, in which, from today, you can pre-order the ‘Collapse EP’ in multiple formats: on vinyl (special first-printing edition and standard edition), on CD, on digital formats (WAV of 24-bit, WAV and FLAC of 16-bit and MP3 of 320kbps) and, yes, also on cassette. Because Aphex Twin is Aphex Twin, and he’ll never cease to be himself. Cassettes are an indispensable part of him.
(Cover Image: © ‘T69 Collapse EP’ by Aphex Twin)
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