Autechre


Autechre are an English electronic music duo consisting of Rob Brown and Sean Booth, both from Rochdale, Greater Manchester. Formed in 1987, they are among the best known acts signed to UK electronic label Warp Records, through which all of Autechre's full-length albums have been released, beginning with their 1993 debut, Incunabula. They gained initial recognition when they were featured on Warp's 1992 compilation, Artificial Intelligence.
Influenced by styles such as 1980s electro and hip-hop, the music of Autechre has evolved throughout their career from early, melodic techno recordings to later works often considered abstract and experimental, featuring complex composition and few stylistic conventions. Their work has been associated with the 1990s electronic genre known as intelligent dance music, though Booth has dismissed the label as "silly".

History

Early years (1987–1992)

Brown and Booth met through Manchester's graffiti scene in 1987 when they both lived in Rochdale. Heavily influenced by electro-funk, hip-hop and acid house, they began trading mixtapes and then creating their own compositions while collecting a handful of cheap equipment, most notably a Casio SK-1 sampler and a Roland TR-606 drum machine. Their first release was Lego Feet, a 12" recorded under an alias of the same name brought out by Manchester's Skam Records.
Their first release as Autechre was the single "Cavity Job" in 1991, released on Hardcore Records. Booth and Brown pronounce the name Autechre with a Rochdale accent. However, they have explained that the name can be pronounced in any way one sees fit. Booth said: "The first two letters were intentional, because there was an 'au' sound in the track, and the rest of the letters were bashed randomly on the keyboard. We had this track title for ages, and we had written it on a cassette, with some graphics. It looked good, and we began using it as our name."
Two more tracks appeared in 1992 under the now finalised Autechre name, on the Warp Records compilation Artificial Intelligence, part of the series of the same name. The compilation contained "The Egg", later reworked for their first full-length release under the title "Eggshell".
Two hours of early material was broadcast live on NTS Radio during Warp's 30th-anniversary weekend, called Warp Tapes 89-93. It is distributed for free on Autechre's Bleep Store in digital audio format.

''Incunabula'' and ''Amber'' (1993–1994)

In 1993 Warp released their debut album, Incunabula, which became a surprise success, reaching the top of the UK Indie Chart. The album had a cool, calculated feel, with clear techno and electro roots, but also showed hints of the rhythmic flourishes and tuned percussion that would later become an important feature of their work. An EP of remixes of Incunabulas "Basscadet" was released in 1994, with animated computer graphics for the Bcdtmx version created by Jess Scott-Hunter. This music video featured on MTV Europe's Party Zone when Autechre were interviewed during the show in September that year. 1994 also saw the release of Amber, an album featuring a more ambient, less percussive approach than their debut.
The Anti EP was released shortly before Amber and is, as of yet, the only Autechre release to have an explicit purpose: it was a protest against the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which would prohibit raves, defined as any gathering of nine or more people where rave music is played. Rave music was defined as music which "includes sounds wholly or predominantly characterized by the emission of a succession of repetitive beats". The record came wrapped in a seal, on which was printed a legal warning: "Flutter has been programmed in such a way that no bars contain identical beats and can therefore be played at both forty-five and thirty-three revolutions under the proposed new law. However, we advise DJs to have a lawyer and musicologist present at all times to confirm the non-repetitive nature of the music in the event of police harassment."
In a 2008 interview with Pitchfork Media, Rob Brown mentioned that Incunabula and Amber, retrospectively, sounded "cheesy". Brown later clarified that "they were perhaps more simple, but not in a shit way".

''Tri Repetae'', ''Chiastic Slide'' and ''LP5'' (1995–1999)

1995 saw the release of Tri Repetae, their third album, as well as the EPs Anvil Vapre and Garbage, featuring a monochrome cover designed by The Designers Republic, with whom Autechre have long held a close association. Tri Repetae and its associated EPs were combined into a two disc set entitled Tri Repetae++, which was released in the United States. An official promotional video was created for "Second Bad Vilbel" from Anvil Vapre by English visual artist Chris Cunningham. The "Second Bad Vilbel" video featured rapidly cut shots of industrial machinery and robotic movement, synchronised with the music. Cunningham later re-edited the video in 2002, following his disappointment with the original: "It was intended to be completely abstract but it didn't quite work out that way". A two track vinyl-only EP entitled We R Are Why, was available to buy during certain concerts and via mail order during 1996. Also in 1995, Autechre's track "Nonima" was featured on Mind The Gap Volume 5, a Belgian compilation of electronic music.
Autechre released three records in 1997: the full-length Chiastic Slide, and the EPs Envane and Cichlisuite. The latter EP consists of five remixed versions of "Cichli" from Chiastic Slide. Radio Mix was also released in 1997; a rare CD-only promotional recording, it contains an hour-long DJ mix of other artists' tracks, some of them remixed by Autechre, as well as a short interview edited sometimes to the point of incomprehensibility.
An untitled record followed in 1998. It has been seen as a transitional work, with Brown commenting in 2005 that "a lot of people have cited it as a classic Autechre album because it bridges the gap between the guys who liked our old stuff and the guys who got propelled on to our new stuff."
1999 saw the release of their first Peel session EP, consisting of three tracks broadcast on John Peel's show for BBC Radio 1 in October 1995, as well as a vinyl-only limited edition promotional EP entitled Splitrmx12. 1999 also saw EP7, which is classed by the group as an EP despite the CD version being over an hour in length.

''Confield'', ''Draft 7.30'' and ''Untilted'' (2000–2007)

The new millennium brought about a drastic change in Autechre's style, demonstrated by Confield and Draft 7.30, as well as the Gantz Graf EP. The title track from Gantz Graf inspired an iconic video by British designer Alex Rutterford, featuring an object synchronised to the music as it morphs, pulsates, shakes and finally dissolves. Rutterford, who had previously created an unofficial video for the Tri Repetae track "Eutow" as part of the Channel 4 music programme Lo-Fi in 2001, claimed the idea for the "Gantz Graf" video came during one of his LSD trips. The second Autechre Peel session EP was also released in 2002, containing four tracks broadcast in 1999, named by John Peel himself. Autechre released three collaborative albums with Andrew M. McKenzie's Hafler Trio collective during the following five years.
Metacritic rated the critical reviews to Confield as "universal acclaim". According to Sean Booth, "most of Confield came out of experiments with Max that weren't really applicable in a club environment." In contrast, 2003's Draft 7.30 was seen by some as an easier record to grasp. Booth stated in an interview around the release of Draft 7.30 that " doesn't seem to limit us in the way it did when we first started. Now I think we just get it, we're totally fluent in it and can be more expressive."
Untilted, the duo's eighth album, was released in 2005. It roughly continued the sound of their previous two LPs, though featured compositions that mutated greatly during their duration, typically alternating between passages of ambience and heavily processed, precise beats, such as on "Ipacial Section". Its final track, "Sublimit", is at almost sixteen minutes; Autechre's longest composition to feature on any of their albums until 2016's elseq 1–5. The release of Untilted was followed by a two-month tour that took the group around Europe, America and Japan, but withdrew them from studio work for an unusual length of time. The outcome of this, coupled with a forced change in studio setup, was a gap of three years between releases, longer than ever before.

''Quaristice'', ''Oversteps'' and ''Exai'' (2008–2013)

Their ninth album, Quaristice, was released in early 2008. In contrast to Untilted, it is made up of twenty tracks, more than any other Autechre release, each typically around 2 to 5 minutes in length. The download-only Quaristice.Quadrange.ep.ae EP that accompanies it brings the total length of music released during their Quaristice era to over five hours. Among this is the hour-long "Perlence subrange 6-36" that closes the EP. Each track on Quaristice was edited down from lengthy improvised sessions between Booth and Brown, some of which were released in longer versions on Quaristice.Quadrange.ep.ae. Although Sean Booth has stated that the FLAC release of Quaristice is the actual product, the album was also released by Warp Records as a double LP and a single CD as well as an elaborate two CD edition by Warp Records. Limited to only 1,000 copies, and containing both the regular album and Quaristice , this special edition was packaged in a photo-etched steel case. It sold out within 12 hours of being announced.
On 13 January 2010, Warp Records announced Oversteps, Autechre's tenth album. Originally slated to be released in March, it was released a month early in digital form on Bleep.com to those who preordered it; the CD and deluxe vinyl editions were released on 22 March 2010. A two-month European tour occurred in support of the album, followed by limited shows in Japan and Australia, the latter breaking a 15-year absence. Autechre then compiled a mix for the magazine FACT, released in February of the same year, that consisted of tracks by artists such as J Dilla and Necrophagist. On 25 May 2010, Warp Records announced the ten track Move of Ten, an EP by the duo in conjunction with the release of Oversteps. The digipack CD and the two 12" vinyl version, as well as a digital download, was released on 12 July 2010.
In April 2011 a boxset of EPs entitled EPs 1991 – 2002 was released, with artwork from the Designers Republic. It includes a CD copy of their debut EP, Cavity Job, the first time it has been released on the format. In 2011 as part of Warp's 'Made in Japan' relief concert for the victims of the 2011 Sendai earthquake, an eleven-minute piece was released entitled "6852", possibly part of a previous live recording.
The eleventh studio album entitled Exai was released on 5 March 2013, having been available for download from the official website as of 14 February 2013. The duo announced their 14th EP L-Event on 17 September 2013, which was released on 28 October 2013.