Autechre Is 'Oversteps' their most mood dependent album?

Unlike any other album of theirs, which I generally tend to enjoy or at least admit is good once it's clicked, Oversteps has brought out total inconsistency in my listening. It's made me feel pretty schizoid in terms of how I respond to music.

Obviously, you won't always be in the mood for something like Confield. But even when you're fed up and not feeling it, you'll still know it's got something special and that you'll enjoy it another day. It won't suddenly sound boringly put together, if if it's irritating you at that very moment. The same goes for almost all their other stuff, imo, and the moment of enjoyment has come pretty much straight away for me, even on (or especially on) their more 'difficult' albums. But, as my idiotic posts about the new one demonstrate, which range from saying it's a masterpiece to saying it's a lazy, meandering pile of bland crap, 'Oversteps' literally sounds great or utterly dull each different time it's put on. Not as in, "I'm not feeling this", but more like, "was this really ever any good? It sounds pretty basic and clumsy and underdeveloped right now. Was I just in wide-eyed fanboy mode when I find it an incredible listen?"

Has anyone else got this with the new one? I would just put it down to the fact it's a new Autechre album and that that always happens, but like I said, I tended to just "get" the harder ones straight away, when they came out - and even when they didn't fit the mood, I could see their value and inherent power. The only Ae album this inconsistency has occurred with is the original Quaristice disc, and now that's ended up being a bit of a meh release for me: it's got some stunning, strunning tracks on there, but enough mediocre moments to make you unsure. Perhaps it's the same with Oversteps.

Edit - the title to this thread is kind of wrong, but I couldn't think of a better one.

I get that the most with Draft to be honest...

the one that is like that for me (as a whole) is chiastic slide; i can really never enjoy several of the tracks on there though i do like some

oversteps i appreciate much more, and i think it's not really mood-dependent so much as depending upon your own musical intelligence

Usual process for me is dislike for the first 4 or 5 listens, then lots of skipping about while I find my favourite stand-out tracks, then back to full album listens to re-experience the whole thing again.

Have to say I didn't like it at all to start with. It felt like a big step backwards from Quaristice. What I heard at Birmingham was where I expected Quaristice to lead.

But now I've got it it's a wonderfully beautiful piece of music - but definately more of a sit-down experience

can't be arsed to listen to Oversteps at the moment tbh.

i gotta listen to it again tbh....

i loved it, but my rotation is so goddamn heavy

in my excitement for oversteps i started spinning their other albums, now i dont want to hear oversteps minus a few jammout tracks. i'm still wrapping my head around Draft

I really like Oversteps. From the first listen I knew it fitted my headspace rather nicely. Though if it's going to be long, hot English summer it won't be played much as it won't fit the vibe.

I actually grown a bit sick of this release (before I even got the vinyl!), and now I´m back to the Quaristice/quadrange series and really appreciate it. It´s so much darker and warmer than Oversteps, and I really appreciate that there´s no max msp wizardry, but them actually jamming out on their Nords.

I think this one is far less mood dependent than most of their other ones.

Sorry forgot to mention my point.

I feel Oversteps is a bit too light, soft and neutral for me in the long run, but I´m sure it will fit the spring much better than the dark winter. Quadrange on the other hand is all about autumn and late summer for me and of course at night.

I agree about those seasons. Though the first two tracks of Oversteps really fit night times in this month (not the rest so much.)

Speaking of which - both the opener and Ilanders blew me away tonight. It's so strange, only this morning, they sounded kind of okay, but nothing special. But tonight, they were something else.

Balance, you're right: 'mood dependent' was kind of a rubbish phase for the title. But I couldn't think of anything else to depict the fact the album can sound unimaginatively constructed and dull one minute, and a masterpiece the next.

I don't really get this with Oversteps, though ilanders, known(1), and Yuop make me very impatient. The rest of the album, to me, is very solid.

The Autechre albums I have the largest fluctuating opinions on are Tri-Repetae and Confield. Sometimes I just really can't get into either of them and other times I enjoy them both a lot.

  On 3/15/2010 at 2:02 AM, Xyrofen said:

The Autechre albums I have the largest fluctuating opinions on are Tri-Repetae and Confield. Sometimes I just really can't get into either of them and other times I enjoy them both a lot.

Yeah, I can definitely relate to Tri Repetae. Sometimes it's great and it just clicks, and other times it seems so, so unnecessarily repetitive and one dimensional, even. I consistently think it's wrong that it's regarded as their best, though. I think everything after it, including Chiastic Slide, is better. But it's still a solid album that was amazing for its time.

  On 3/15/2010 at 2:27 AM, Lianne said:

  On 3/15/2010 at 2:02 AM, Xyrofen said:

The Autechre albums I have the largest fluctuating opinions on are Tri-Repetae and Confield. Sometimes I just really can't get into either of them and other times I enjoy them both a lot.

 

Yeah, I can definitely relate to Tri Repetae. Sometimes it's great and it just clicks, and other times it seems so, so unnecessarily repetitive and one dimensional, even. I consistently think it's wrong that it's regarded as their best, though. I think everything after it, including Chiastic Slide, is better. But it's still a solid album that was amazing for its time.

I've barely listened to Chiastic Slide. I'd venture to say I don't like it, but I don't feel I've listened to it enough to have an opinion as I remember almost none of the song names off of it.

I agree with that, I don't think Tri-Repetae should be regarded as their best at all. Though it may be the best to give people a "taste of Autechre" if you had to recommend an album and didn't want to scare them off (like Confield and Draft 7.30 might).

i dont understand how AE fans can NOT love Chiastic Slide. I've listened to that one the most as it was the first AE album i heard.

Tri Rep is great but I lump it in with Amber, Incunubula, etc as being from the early era when they were more influenced by their peers. Then they went to outer space where they still currently reside.

I've found out - the reason it's so variable for me whether I love this album or don't like it is that the second half is much weaker than the first, imo. If I listen to tracks 1-8, I'm left feeling like I had a great musical adventure and am fully satisfied. But, while there are moments of greatness after that, I feel that generally the rest of the tracks are pretty weak or underdeveloped sounding. The final three are especially unimpressive, really: synthy, mushy, beatless, easy on the ears (which is fine generally, but three easy-listening-ey numbers in a row to finish off an AUTECHRE album is a bit disappointing....)

Can't wait to see what's next in store, though. I've actually enjoyed what I heard of the live stuff. I know lots of people are raving about Oversteps, and I agree that it's a fine album, but I think much of it has to do with the fact that melodies are back and all of those reviewers didn't really get on so well with the Confield-era materials. Going back to Confield just reminds me how potent Autechre's music can be, and I hope they can recover a bit of edge with whatever happens next.

Can't bloody edit -

I'm not saying that st epreo, redfall, krYlon, or Yuop are rubbish pieces of music: just that, all in sequence, they do leave the mind a little bored and unchallenged. The final quarter of the album really lost me and my friends. It's because it's neither deep, dark ambience, nor particularly involving or active music. And those same synth sounds, by this point of the album, have grown a little tired, even if they flare up occasionally or have little sweeps here and there.

But these tracks are not 'underdeveloped' sounding. I don't know why the hell I wrote that before. Rather, the cumulative effect of the last lot of tracks, for some reason, is rather underwhelming.

I kind of agree - the album past os veix3 or so is weaker than the first part - but I've grown to really like krylon. I do find yuop to have very little appeal after the first few listens.

lol you big cuddly nutty geek, give us a hug

i own gantz graf, draft, untilted and quaristice on vinyl...i'll be getting oversteps, and after that , confield eventually. i collect them but since that time, confield, when they got all extremely experimental.... it's a good collecting starting point...

Oversteps sounds alot like Oversteps

I don't understand the hate for the second half of Oversteps. The only track I'm not super-keen on is O=0, but that's because I like the tracks after it so much more. d-sho qub, st epreo, and krYlon are some of my favorites... Going based on the "half" concept, we'd be starting at Treale, which is indeed a good track. Then os veix3 has some of my favorite meanderings to it of all Æ meanderings. I can't say I love Yuop, but I usually just zone out to it, so I'd consider it relaxing if anything and a nice cap to the whole album as is. Redfall has some of my favorite melodies.

I guess, all in all, the only ones I feel I don't really like are O=0 and sometimes Yuop. known(1) can be tedious, but I love the under melodies/melodies that start it off, so it works out for me in the long run. I don't expect Oversteps to wear on me, but I'm not obsessed about it being "GREAT" like I was with Draft 7.30 after I got into, same with Quaristice. I do enjoy a nice sit through Oversteps compared to some other albums as albums like Confield and Untilted wear on me when I just sit through them, despite being great albums. They're the ones I'm more likely to just pick a few tracks from then go onto other things with.

Edit for the obligatory braindance icon.