Incunabula.

this review originally appeared in issue forty three of select magazine, january ninteen ninety four

The word on 'intelligent' techno is that it's the music of the future. Wrong, it's the music of now. The Artificial Intelligence project may have lumbered Warp with a lot of unwanted cybernetic driftwood, but really there's nothing here going to have to wait 50 years to experience better in virtual space.

Autechre is two Northern studio hounds whos intricate inventions have taken up where LFO and the early Warp affiliates left off, with the robotic plink-plonk aesthetic now fossilised several notches down the evolutionary scale. Their unhurried approach (at 70-odd minutes this is the longest AI album yet) lets them glide from the stellar melodies of 'Bike,' through the strange vocal emissions that filter into 'Autriche' and into the echoing experimental chamber of 'Basscadet'.

This not only perks up the listener ('Incunabula' isn't one of those extended cures for insomnia) but provides the basic continuity and structure which is the hallmark of the modern techno long-player. Another Warp essential.