XI year old Autechre Album Released: Exai (WARP234)

There's a few tracks that have things like breakdowns and then slow huge rebuilds

ooh, that sounds good, the "rebuilds" part. They use the "track falls apart into lurching spastic colon before ending" trick too many times imo.

Question: how much do you like the album so far, overall? Are you still excited to listen to it every time? Does it feels like it has depth and replay value? Any tracks that just blow you away?

  On 1/20/2013 at 3:31 AM, pixelives said:

  On 1/19/2013 at 10:41 PM, Awepittance said:

  On 1/19/2013 at 5:53 PM, pixelives said:

If I had the time (which I don't at the moment) I'd write up a review. Maybe later this coming week, though. At this point I'm moving past initial impressions and will need a few more listens to go deeper with it. Right now I can answer specific questions. I can also just leave it alone if it's bothering people. I understand that it might be ruining the discovery process for when you do hear it.

 

one more question! what kind of sound palette does this album have?

 

Oversteps had a lot of fm synth and physical modeling bell sounds with very clean crisp percussion, but very little overt 'Elektron' sound. I noticed you said it sounds like alot of Elektron stuff is being used here, but is it mixed cleanly more like Untilted with a lot of compression and not very much reverb or is it more like Quaristice where its used in a sort of grimey soggy way?

 

i sort of miss the more claustraphobic, compressed mostly reverb free mixing style of Untilted, Draft and Confield

It is very varied in terms of production like a lot of different ways of working were used. The Elektron stuff pops out at certain times. Not much in the way of bell type chimey stuff tho. Compression is used but in a very different way than the pressure chamber way in Untilted. It's used a lot as a modulating element, screwing and ducking reverb or other high end. but not in an annoying shitty EDM big room way.

 

There's a lot of reverb on this album, but it's not like Quar or Oversteps. Almost used as a compositional tool

 

Lots of delay used too. On snares, dubby stuff, ping pong, etc...

interesting, thanks for addressing my question. In a way i really miss that sort of 'thin' chamber pressure sound that Draft had which was slightly made to sound more full and in your face with Untilted. Draft is the album that inspired me to start using a lot of compression on 'weird' or field recording based sounds, up until it's release I never really heard someone using such weird sound design by stripping away the dynamics in such a way. It works great for that album. From the only track we've heard so far, it sounds like they are using a more 'move of ten' sound bed but with much more elaborate composition and sequencing. Would you say just isolating the sound design/sound palette is this most similar to Move of Ten, Quaristice or Untilted ? The use of a lot of dubbed out effects as you describe takes me back to tracks like Perlence

Somebody asked earlier what "color" I would use to describe this LP.. Trying to figure that out now.. There might not be just one, but more of a palette/tone range.

  On 1/20/2013 at 3:54 AM, Awepittance said:

  On 1/20/2013 at 3:31 AM, pixelives said:

  On 1/19/2013 at 10:41 PM, Awepittance said:

  On 1/19/2013 at 5:53 PM, pixelives said:

If I had the time (which I don't at the moment) I'd write up a review. Maybe later this coming week, though. At this point I'm moving past initial impressions and will need a few more listens to go deeper with it. Right now I can answer specific questions. I can also just leave it alone if it's bothering people. I understand that it might be ruining the discovery process for when you do hear it.

 

one more question! what kind of sound palette does this album have?

 

Oversteps had a lot of fm synth and physical modeling bell sounds with very clean crisp percussion, but very little overt 'Elektron' sound. I noticed you said it sounds like alot of Elektron stuff is being used here, but is it mixed cleanly more like Untilted with a lot of compression and not very much reverb or is it more like Quaristice where its used in a sort of grimey soggy way?

 

i sort of miss the more claustraphobic, compressed mostly reverb free mixing style of Untilted, Draft and Confield

It is very varied in terms of production like a lot of different ways of working were used. The Elektron stuff pops out at certain times. Not much in the way of bell type chimey stuff tho. Compression is used but in a very different way than the pressure chamber way in Untilted. It's used a lot as a modulating element, screwing and ducking reverb or other high end. but not in an annoying shitty EDM big room way.

 

There's a lot of reverb on this album, but it's not like Quar or Oversteps. Almost used as a compositional tool

 

Lots of delay used too. On snares, dubby stuff, ping pong, etc...

 

interesting, thanks for addressing my question. In a way i really miss that sort of 'thin' chamber pressure sound that Draft had which was slightly made to sound more full and in your face with Untilted. Draft is the album that inspired me to start using a lot of compression on 'weird' or field recording based sounds, up until it's release I never really heard someone using such weird sound design by stripping away the dynamics in such a way. It works great for that album. From the only track we've heard so far, it sounds like they are using a more 'move of ten' sound bed but with much more elaborate composition and sequencing. Would you say just isolating the sound design/sound palette is this most similar to Move of Ten, Quaristice or Untilted ? The use of a lot of dubbed out effects as you describe takes me back to tracks like Perlence

Sound palette is definitely not Quaristice. There are MoT elements in sound design but more flushed out and I get some beat feeling from Untilted, but sounding more like MoT/Oversteps due to the lushness and wide sonics

If people are looking for the deep freeze chamber of Draft/Untilted. It's not here. This is a much warmer affair.

Definitely. Was saying about how it had a live feel in parts in part due to this...

as someone who uses synths, are AE using any interesting synth trickery that you can put into words? For example, Y7 has an odd high frequency modulated synth line that comes in about halfway through i would describe it as fractal esque (starts around 2:05)

ah theswere, I forgot about that one. lovely track, it's ae's goon gumpas

Definitely some use of mood strings and pads. But i'm on that fourth/fifth listen, getting past initial impressions and trying to go deeper, so I'm having a hard time recalling specific moments.

This is probably going to sound bad to a lot of you but the main synth line in T ess xi is a decending synth piano chord that brings to mind late 90's Stereolab (dots an loops era). I like it..

can't hear any straight xox's anywhere..

Dots and Loops well liked here.

Oh good.

  On 1/20/2013 at 3:20 AM, pixelives said:

  On 1/20/2013 at 1:54 AM, Obel said:

bnc castl is great, what are you guys, dumb? Jesus.

love bouncy castle to be honest. drunken robo funk have taken the brown acid

Bnc castl makes me think of pixelated clowns. As in, Atari 2600 pixelated.

I still think T ess xi looks way to much like r ess...

Also, can someone change this into something that makes sense [i'm too lazy]. [Wiki]

"All songs written and composed by Sean Booth and Rob Brown."

Are there any tracks with a synth line as clear and prominent as in Theswere?

How does the Perlence family of tracks compare to the album?

In general does this feel like a brand new thing like Oversteps was overall a brand new thing than what they did before. Or does this feel like an evolution of oversteps/move of ten era.

Any tracks that upon hearing for the first time you were like "oh yeah this is like that/a next step from that" (don't tell me the names of them please). Trying to gauage if your first listen to the album was like "I don't know what I'm listening to/this sounds like".

Lots of questions, but I don't feel like I'm any closer to knowing what this album sounds than before I read your other responses(which is fine by me).

Thanks

Theswere sounds like it belongs in the soundtrack to Mischief Makers. Also, this...

Not much in the way of that Perlence stuff, which I would describe as "Glacial"

Some bits like the classic plaintive chords and melodies of Theswere.

it seems like a refinement of the Oversteps body of work, but more "down to business," and less overtly melancholy, but keeping that moody melody that has been happening throughout the entire discography. Synths are sometimes pushed into the background and sometimes up in front.

As I said before it's like a total refinement of all the elements we've seen come from them.

Less like, "we're gonna use this overarching concept for the entire album" and more like, "we're gonna bring all our best elements together as a cohesive whole."

I said before that it seems like they're having fun and rolling with it..

Every piece kind of operates in it's own universe.

I think this album will be right up my alley

pixelives, you are achieving ae subforum immortality for telling us all this.

  On 1/20/2013 at 7:37 AM, vproc said:

pixelives, you are achieving ae subforum immortality for telling us all this.

haha. thanks. sInce I'm mostly a lurker/non-poster in these parts.

i hope that all waffles/what account holders here have been doing an Exai search daily, mahalo!

currently my homepage

  On 1/20/2013 at 8:18 AM, Stickfigger said:

is there anything as dark as Parhelic Triangle from Confield?

vekoS has some of those dissonant ambiences but is more funky. IT'S REALLY FUNKY. Trashcan madman funk.

With an FM acidish snakeline