So, it’s been a while since I’ve written anything on Autechre. I still adore their work, but damned if they haven’t made it hard to write about these last few years.
If you need catching up, here’s a guide I wrote to their earlier work. They’ve been around for three decades now, and the whole time, they’ve been at the bleeding edge of electronic music. While other experimental artists may trade in academic rigor, Autechre’s friskier tendencies have always been tempered by their roots in 1990s hip-hop. While they can certainly get difficult at times, there’s always a guidepost, even if it’s not evident on first listen.
The problem is, those guideposts have been spread pretty thin the last few years. Their last proper “album” was Exai in 2013. Then they released 8 hours of live sets. Then came the 4-record, 4-hour collection elseq. Then came another 19 hours of live sets. Continued...