What is it about Autechre?

[Konnan]

Start at the beginning of their discography and let the albums sink in. Like BoC, it takes some time to digest the material and truely see the greatness of it all.

Start with Incunabula... songs like 444, Windwind, Bike. Give it some time and then go further with Amber. Good luck and have fun !

[Helios]

Count me as another who is quite fond of 'Nil'!

I'm quite selective about Autechre myself... Helios, I can only but really recommend going back and checking earlier albums if you haven't already - Incunabula, Amber, Tri Repetae - to see if there's anything at all of interest there.

Often, when someone says they like or don't like Autechre, my internal response is always "Which Autechre?" - such a massive degree of change sound-wise that it's likely easier to refer to an era than to the band themselves...

If a person's first experience of Autechre is, for example, 'Gantz Graf', they take a view of the entire style based on it without hearing anything from earlier and then sometime later they're played a track such as 'Eutow' without being told it's Autechre, I expect they'd never guess it.

There are at least a small handful of certain Autechre tracks I genuinely rate higher than certain Boards of Canada tracks - but (at the moment at least) by and large these are all circa the 1st half of the 1990s!

Ahh! Ok, now I remember. I used to listen to Tri Repetae back in the day, and foudn it enjoyable. I guess I don't mind early Autechre, but I can't stand what they've evolved to.

[mono]

Be sure to get the EPs that came with Tri Repetae if you are into early Autechre - both are pretty awesome. As for later Autechre, you might try to get into LP5/EP7 and jump into Untilted from that...

[Helios]

Thanks for the recommendations, guys. Will check them out. Listening to Slip right now and probably the best Autechre tune I've heard.

[El Camino]

Never been able to get into Autechre, but i've only heard individual tracks. What would be the entry level Autechre album?

[mono]

Depends on what you like, but usually the best way is to get into their albums chronologically as they progressively get weirder. Fan favourites from each period include just about any album, but I've seen Amber, Tri Repetae, LP5 and Untilted cited often as highlights. I'd add the Garbage EP (around the time of Amber) and Chiastic Slide to that list.

[m1a100]

Actually, I had the same idea about it. Autechre has a strange relationship of "love it or hate it".

With me, I didn't had patience when Autechre's Exai was released. Right now, I can say that Exai have some really EPIC moments. Still, the album's length (two hours) for me still too much for and it could have been improved by more editing, trimming and erasing some less important moments of these tracks, because they extend for too long ("irlite (get 0)" is the best example of a track which would be more enjoyable and less boring if it was cut down to ~6 minutes).

Still, their 'glitchy phase' it's a little hard to "get it" sometimes. It really depends on my mood. Sometimes, it sounds chaotic and epic. Sometimes, it's boring and totally random. But, in case, I'll always stick with albums like Untilted and LP5. Different from the others albums of their actual phase, I can sit and enjoy some of these percussions rapes (Augmatic Disport and Iera <3).

[Impossible Geometry]

Start at the beginning of their discography and let the albums sink in. Like BoC, it takes some time to digest the material and truely see the greatness of it all.

Start with Incunabula... songs like 444, Windwind, Bike. Give it some time and then go further with Amber. Good luck and have fun !

The only problem with starting with Incunabula is, its too "safe". haha. I personally would start at their peak, imho, LP5. Listen to LP5 a few times and if you can't get into this one, you might just wanna give up on autechre. It's their most digestible album without being too safe, if that makes any sense. It's still a little challenging but its nothing like gantz graf.

[El Camino]

Okay well i think i'll listen to LP5 first, then i'll try out some of their other early stuff, then if i really like it i'll go further.
Thanks for the recommendations

[noby]

The only problem with starting with Incunabula is, its too "safe". haha. I personally would start at their peak, imho, LP5. Listen to LP5 a few times and if you can't get into this one, you might just wanna give up on autechre. It's their most digestible album without being too safe, if that makes any sense. It's still a little challenging but its nothing like gantz graf.

Why not just listen to the stuff that it's good? What does it matter whether it's (too) "safe" or not? Personally I don't think any of Autechre is challenging at all. I'd recommend starting from the beginning because it's interesting to hear how their sound has progressed.

[Impossible Geometry]

I'd recommend starting from the beginning because it's interesting to hear how their sound has progressed.

yeah, this is true.

[Tonic]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJjenMorwmU

[Shortwave]

Couldn't agree more with the first post. I consider myself "open" and willing to appreciate several different sounds and genres, and in fact I do, but Autechre sound utterly boring to me. Also I can not really spot any possible similarity with BoC - they sound like polar opposites to me!

[Distant Nebulus]

I consider myself a bigger fan of Autechre than BoC, and am actually less of a fan of their earlier releases versus their more recent complex releases, such as Ep7, Confield, Untilted, etc..Its almost a given that a Autechre track will evolve into something completely amazing from where it began. This happens the most on UNTILTED. Most of the tracks begin with a more abrasive experimental approach and then evolve into this distant melodic composition that is so eccentric and beautiful, it becomes addicting. I suggest you approach Ae with patients, and NEVER build your opinion off of the first 30 seconds of a track.

* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sK6MCvIXF6M
* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc3PICQh1AI
* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtC-iN_PFlM - An extreme example of evolving from abrasive to amazing.

[Negamuse]

The crazy thing about Autechre is to consider what would or wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for the daftness of the UK government under Prime Minister John Major.

1994 saw them pass the Criminal Justice Bill http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_J ... r_Act_1994 which sought to outlaw the public performance of "music characterised in whole or in part by the emission of repetitive beats". (Basically a kneejerk to early 90s rave music). So Autechre put out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti_EP as a protest with that one track that totally disposes of 4/4 rhythm as a "fuck you" and to be something that could still be played freely when the law passed though as the liner notes said "we recommend you have a musicologist to hand to confirm the non-repetitive nature of the beats".

I love Amber, (its the perfect distillation of the Warp sound of its day) and to a lesser extent their first LP but you can divide their entire career into everything that came before Anti and everything that came after. And you know, maybe the plan all along was to go the way they've gone, who knows. But this one track stands there in the middle as the track that sent them on this structure-smashing trajectory into what they've done since.

[Cupz]

England really is the worst country in the world, isn't it?

[Negamuse]

England really is the worst country in the world, isn't it?

Until the revolution (next year?), yeah.

[re-phaelam-ed]

I've briefly mentioned this on the BoC board, but I want to have a focused discussion on what it is people like about Autechre. It seems that most people who love BoC, also love Autechre, and I just can't understand what is appealing about them. The music is extremely glitchy, noisy, sharp and just all around frustrating and grating to listen to (especially when comparing to BoC).

I wanted this to be specifically about Autechre, but I think the same thing applies to Plaid and other "weird electronica" artists. I used to listen to many acts in this genre, and I've found myself just always going back to BoC to clean my ears. With the exception of some Aphex Twin (key word: some), I can't get behind any of these guys.

Folks, what am I missing?

the answer
clipper

second scout

laughing quarter

bladelores [you get into it the more you listen to them]

rale

444

nil

skin up you're already dead


listen to how CLEAN....and FULL and LAYERED this stuff is. it inspires so much thought for me. the last three are just so amazing. tell me skin up youre already dead isnt fantastic!

i have to agree though...they have gone in a direction for the last 4 albums that have been very samey...and with this last release L-Event....it is the first piece they put out that i was disappointed with. the 4 piece in a row that is basically the same. maybe they used different gear. but it the same stuff.
perhaps people are just hoping with each release that they kinda go back to the old stuff. that shit was so awesome.
the live stuff they tour with to promote these new releases is SO good though. i wish they would put that stuff out as a release.

live 2008

holy shit this was good!

then you have the GESCOM offshoot....freakin awesome
viral

keynell - its fun to listen to all the keynell key nell versions!

[Aesthetics]

The crazy thing about Autechre is to consider what would or wouldn't have happened if it hadn't been for the daftness of the UK government under Prime Minister John Major.

1994 saw them pass the Criminal Justice Bill http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_J ... r_Act_1994 which sought to outlaw the public performance of "music characterised in whole or in part by the emission of repetitive beats". (Basically a kneejerk to early 90s rave music). So Autechre put out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti_EP as a protest with that one track that totally disposes of 4/4 rhythm as a "fuck you" and to be something that could still be played freely when the law passed though as the liner notes said "we recommend you have a musicologist to hand to confirm the non-repetitive nature of the beats".

I love Amber, (its the perfect distillation of the Warp sound of its day) and to a lesser extent their first LP but you can divide their entire career into everything that came before Anti and everything that came after. And you know, maybe the plan all along was to go the way they've gone, who knows. But this one track stands there in the middle as the track that sent them on this structure-smashing trajectory into what they've done since.

This thought passed my mind a few times as well.
At first I thought the whole Anti EP thing was a joke. It was only after I investigated the whole bill, that I realized this wasn't utter bullshit but was actually going to be real.

Excuse my ignorance but now 17 years later, with the help of internet which I hadn't at the time, I understand that this bill actually exist...? Although the article implies that the bill actually exist I can't wrap my head around it. Does anyone know if there were parties canceled due to this bill?

[Aesthetics]

Helios: The beauty of Ae can't be told, you have to feel it.

I did kind of lost them after Draft though, with the exception of a few songs on every release.