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[Radio 4] The Cult of Aphex Twin

Started by Sebastian Cobb, July 06, 2018, 09:38:43 AM

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Sebastian Cobb

Quote
Music writer John Doran ventures into the strange world of Richard D James. Over the course of three decades James, known to his legion of hardcore fans as Aphex Twin, has achieved the primary but evasive aim of most serious musicians - the invention, exploration and curation of a truly unique and inimitable sound.

Born in Ireland and raised in Cornwall, James was radicalised by the underground acid house phenomenon that swept UK clubs in the late 1980s but, unlike many of his peers, he seemed equally influenced by ambient, New York minimalism, power electronics, avant composition, techno, industrial and pop music.

By combining these strands, he became just about "as important as a single figure can get in electronic music" and the more that the press wanted to speak to him the more he treated their attention with a mixture of irritation, gleeful mischief and wilful myth building.

Realising that legend is often much more interesting than truth, he slowly began to construct a personal mythos that many still believe to this day. Does he really write songs while asleep after training himself in the practice of lucid dreaming? Does he drive a tank round Cornwall? Did he once live in a bank vault in the middle of the Elephant And Castle roundabout? Does he own a submarine? Does his DJ tech rider include a food processor and sheets of sandpaper? Does he move among his many fans on electronic dance music forums online, often trolling them and stirring up these very myths?

In an attempt to disentangle the man from the myth, we hear from fans such as comedian Vic Reeves and those who know him best such as musicians Tom Middleton, Leila, David Toop and Scanner.

Fan of 25 years John Doran believes that James should be seen as a Cornish folk musician. While a lot of time has been spent talking about how groundbreaking his music has been over the years, less thought has been devoted to discussing how he is also a conduit to the pre-Christian culture of the Cornish past, not just through the song names he chooses or the natural textures of plant and mineral that his music evokes, but also because he is a product of the Cornish myth-making tradition himself and part of a proud heritage that includes mermaids, giants, piskies and pobel vean.

Presented by John Doran
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b88k6l

Will give that a listen.

Thanks for sharing

Twed

I'd argue that this is all answered by Richard himself.

QuoteI'm just some irritating, lying, ginger kid from Cornwall who should have been locked up in some youth detention centre. I just managed to escape and blag it into music.

But hearing Vic Reeves talking about Aphex Twin? I'm in.

Deyv

I love Aphex Twin, but found this documentary embarrassing to listen to. It seemed to consist of people trying to find wankier and wankier ways of saying "I like his music, it is good."

Rich Uncle Skeleton

Right thats all I needed to know, thanks for the heads up.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: Twed on July 06, 2018, 07:42:41 PM
I'd argue that this is all answered by Richard himself.

But hearing Vic Reeves talking about Aphex Twin? I'm in.

I liked that. 'he said that's better'.

Didn't realise a lot of fans didn't like Drukqs, I always thought it was brilliant.

Deyv

It is definitely brilliant, but I can see why some people would have a problem with it. Pitchfork didn't even know how to pronounce the title.

I didn't mean to shit on your recommending this documentary, by the way. I know I called it embarrassing but I'm listening to it again now. It's good, just took me a while to come round to it.

Sebastian Cobb

To be honest I need to listen to it properly as well. I was half coding and half titting about on the Internet with a hangover, not much went in.

I stumbled across it on reddit, and figured I should pass it on.

I've always liked the bullshit aspect of Aphex, it's very similar to the self-generated rumours surrounding Morris. I've even heard warp have made unfounded rumours about other artists being him (The Tuss?) to try and shift more units.

I heard about 10 years ago both him and squarepusher command around 30 grand for a set because they don't like doing it very much.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 08:34:16 PM

I heard about 10 years ago both him and squarepusher command around 30 grand for a set because they don't like doing it very much.

30 grand!?!!

We're in the wrong job.

banana

Roughly add another zero for the current Aphex fee...

Deyv

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 08:34:16 PM
I've always liked the bullshit aspect of Aphex, it's very similar to the self-generated rumours surrounding Morris. I've even heard warp have made unfounded rumours about other artists being him (The Tuss?) to try and shift more units.

I agree, it's similar to Morris but probably a fair bit better. The idea that he drives a tank around Cornwall or whatever, it's so bonkers I want to believe it. The story about Morris filling a studio with helium during a news broadcast just makes me think "that's not true." This probably wasn't worth saying, this bit.

Sebastian Cobb

He fringes it perfectly, one of them is him saying the first music he made was on a sinclair zx80. This was a machine that didn't have a sound generator, but you could make it make noise by writing code that made the picture circuitry bleed into the part of the television signal that makes sound.

Based on what we know about afx it's equally possible he deliberately name dropped a soundless computer or wrote some code to exploit the system.

hummingofevil

Quote from: Deyv on July 06, 2018, 08:20:34 PM
It is definitely brilliant, but I can see why some people would have a problem with it. Pitchfork didn't even know how to pronounce the title.

But how DO you pronouce the title?

Deyv

To rhyme with truckqs. I could be wrong, though.

Thanks for filling me in about the sinclair zx80, Mr Cobb, I hadn't heard about that before.

alan nagsworth

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 08:34:16 PM
I've even heard warp have made unfounded rumours about other artists being him (The Tuss?) to try and shift more units.

Tuss definitely is Aphex though.

I pronounce most weird titles exactly how they sound in my head when I first seem them, so Drukqs has always been "drucks" to me.

a duncandisorderly

I only have one of his albums, though I heard a great deal of the more commercial stuff while working at Mtv.... I'm more of a tom j fan myself, & have loads of squarepusher. RDJ's early stuff interested me precsiely up until the first time I heard autechre. one thing I did cop, though, from "sine waves" IIRC, was adding bits of deliberate bad engineering just to annoy like-minded listeners, the sort of thing that a regular person wouldn't notice. I've tried to do that on all the r.m.i. albums to some degree.

TL; DR- as with zappa, don't really like his music, but love the fact he/it exists.

Sebastian Cobb

I don't think they mentioned it on the documentary but he buried his fucking face in windowlicker, if you spectrograph it:


a duncandisorderly

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 07, 2018, 01:25:21 AM
I don't think they mentioned it on the documentary but he buried his fucking face in windowlicker, if you spectrograph it:



excellent.

Shaky

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 08:12:11 PM
Didn't realise a lot of fans didn't like Drukqs, I always thought it was brilliant.

I do recall it being met with a fair bit of disdain at the time, perhaps because it's pretty dark, dense and lacks the lighter immediacy of something like Windowlicker.

This doco sounds like a bit of a waste of time. I'm far from a Twin expert but is it just repeating all the old stories?

Chriddof

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 09:44:03 PM
He fringes it perfectly, one of them is him saying the first music he made was on a sinclair zx80. This was a machine that didn't have a sound generator, but you could make it make noise by writing code that made the picture circuitry bleed into the part of the television signal that makes sound.

Based on what we know about afx it's equally possible he deliberately name dropped a soundless computer or wrote some code to exploit the system.

I can't remember where I saw this, but someone online claimed that the sound generation program was real, but wasn't actually written by James. It was a computer magazine type-in listing produced by someone else, and they won something like £9 for it - James has claimed he was the person who won that type-in prize, and has mentioned figures of about £60 or so in the past. And I just found this:

QuoteThere was a sound expansion for the ZX81, however, most software was noise free, as the base hardware even lacked an on-board speaker. However through it's life clever tricks came to pass including clever use of switching between FAST and SLOW modes which which could induce tones in the video signal and thereby creating some crude sound synthesis.

Not a single mention of Aphex Twin anywhere on that page, despite that information.

the

Haven't listened to this yet, but I do find the whole 'mythos' thing about Aphex Twin - like the similar mythos of Chris Morris - to be the saddest shit and by far the least interesting thing about them.

They tend to attract the kind of excruciating online fans who are just competing to be the one who can say 'He just doesn't care yeah?' the loudest. Well so fucking what. Anything to not talk about their actual work.

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 06, 2018, 08:12:11 PMDidn't realise a lot of fans didn't like Drukqs, I always thought it was brilliant.

Fans who don't like Drukqs mystify me too. It's a lumpy listen because it's two sets of things interleaved (acoustic instrumentals and dense tracker tunes), but man those tracker tunes are the hardest, sharpest acidic funk going (with additional wooziness of course). Felt like everything from Hangable Auto Bulb onwards was leading up to that.

Twed


Rocket Surgery

Quote from: a duncandisorderly on July 07, 2018, 01:01:51 AM
one thing I did cop, though, from "sine waves" IIRC, was adding bits of deliberate bad engineering just to annoy like-minded listeners, the sort of thing that a regular person wouldn't notice.

Could you explain what you mean by this/give examples? I'm a total dunce when it comes to that sort of thing but I do find it pretty fascinating. Several of the most obsessive Aphex fans I've met have also been tech geeks (compared to me, anyway...) and that's the first I've heard about it. What makes it "bad" engineering if it sounds fine to the laity?

BlodwynPig

Quote from: Twed on July 07, 2018, 06:55:38 PM
How can anybody not like Mt Saint Michel + Saint Michaels Mount

I'm not a huge Aphex fan apart from his early works, but that is great. Venetian Flares

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: Rocket Surgery on July 07, 2018, 10:51:51 PM
Could you explain what you mean by this/give examples? I'm a total dunce when it comes to that sort of thing but I do find it pretty fascinating. Several of the most obsessive Aphex fans I've met have also been tech geeks (compared to me, anyway...) and that's the first I've heard about it. What makes it "bad" engineering if it sounds fine to the laity?

I'd have to dig out the CD, but the stuff I mean is very subtle glitchy stuff, or odd bits of clipping (distortion) which I initially thought were just carelessness. they're just enough to keep you from getting too comfortable during a listen. make you think the CD's a bit fucked, sort of thing.
again, I think autechre did more of this, & I preferred their take on the whole lab vibe. them & squarepusher, who's also one of my favourite bassists.

Sebastian Cobb

Aphex did like a bit of the old glitch but I wouldn't put digital clipping down as a 'technical mistake'. Rock music (especially Rick Rubin) had been abusing cd's in that way for years1. Have you ever heard Blood Sugar Sex Magik? It's actually fatiguing to listen to with all the clipping and compression.

Someone on The Register website reviewed some bit of audio equipment or other and used it as one of the sources and I've never had a bigger urge to write a strongly worded letter to the editor.

Do like a bit of autechre though, tri repate is fucking ace.



1 The loudness war has absolutely fucked cd's. They were designed to provide us with more dynamic range than vinyl, but almost always don't, and vinyl often has better dynamic range simply because it physically can't handle being brickwalled and clipped.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: Chriddof on July 07, 2018, 06:17:19 AM
I can't remember where I saw this, but someone online claimed that the sound generation program was real, but wasn't actually written by James. It was a computer magazine type-in listing produced by someone else, and they won something like £9 for it - James has claimed he was the person who won that type-in prize, and has mentioned figures of about £60 or so in the past. And I just found this:

Not a single mention of Aphex Twin anywhere on that page, despite that information.

I've always been open minded about that. I kind of took it that it was a common exploit - run this code to make your computer make your telly accidentally make a noise. And that he harnessed that to make something.

So basically i figured in my head, if you loop through the exploit several times and change a certain variable you can get a different tone and can build a melody.

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 08, 2018, 01:03:30 AM
Aphex did like a bit of the old glitch but I wouldn't put digital clipping down as a 'technical mistake'...... The loudness war has absolutely fucked cd's. They were designed to provide us with more dynamic range than vinyl, but almost always don't, and vinyl often has better dynamic range simply because it physically can't handle being brickwalled and clipped.

no, not loudness-war-style soft comp-limiting or even digital clipping- this was actual analogue distortion... analogue clipping... like when you overdrive a pre-amp, & in the instance I'm referring to, it was on a sound & in a part of the record where it sounded wrong & stood out like a sore cock. I should add that I've worked in audio since the late 70s & my own contribution to the loudness-wars was tweaking up the db-max units on the Mtv europe channels so that (to paraphrase the late great ian kilmister) everything was louder than everything else.

I hate CD remasters, & new stuff on CD gives me listener fatigue after mere minutes.

the context is important- compression like orban's optimod or TC's db-max are used by broadcasters for all sorts of reasons- to maximise impact & audibility, especially if the sound is being heard by listeners with a high level of ambient noise (factory, car, whatever) & if the content is of variable provenance & needs levelling, but manual control is difficult &/or expensive*. but on things that you've bought & paid for, & are intending to listen to on your hifi & without anything else making a noise (except perhaps the gentle fizz of your lager, the wife putting the kettle on, a stray seed popping in the spliff...) the dynamic range can & should be as the artists intended.

(*I tried, &- clearly- failed to get my own employers & other broadcasters to use the scheduling & playout automation systems to actively control loudness based on metadata held against each playlist item. thus, a movie would have a 'map' of loud & quiet bits, & the playout automation would anticipate, based on these, & not wake anyone up by playing a daftly loud commercial during a break in a quiet bit of the movie, say. I was at a lot of the industry-wide meetings that resulted in the CALM thing for tv commercials too.)

Twed

Some early Aphex stuff is sourced from cassette tapes. That might be responsible for things sounding a little degraded.

On the subject of Aphex, SAW I has been ruined for me a bit by Die Antwoord - Ugly Boy. Now one of the tracks has lyrics in my mind, and is no longer a lovely abstract thing.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: Twed on July 08, 2018, 05:47:02 AM
Some early Aphex stuff is sourced from cassette tapes. That might be responsible for things sounding a little degraded.

On the subject of Aphex, SAW I has been ruined for me a bit by Die Antwoord - Ugly Boy. Now one of the tracks has lyrics in my mind, and is no longer a lovely abstract thing.

Orbital's Chime Live was like that. They actually ran the cassette master into a DAT when taking it to record companies so as to look more professional.