Plaid - 'Spokes' (Warp) Released 20/10/03

Long overlooked in favour of less esoteric outfits on Warp, post-acid duo Plaid are used to working on the fringes. After all, when you exist on the periphery of an already pretty-****ing-peripheral genre (‘progressive electronica’, ‘intelligent dance’, call it what you will), you must get fairly accustomed to obscurity. This is the general public’s sad misfortune: Plaid’s music is as inventive and entertaining as anything by Aphex Twin, Squarepusher or Boards Of Canada, and if anyone has earned a serious reappraisal, it’s them.

‘Spokes’ is their fifth album thus far under the Warp banner, and it’s also their best. Chiefly hailed, when they have been at all, for their genre-busting sequencer passages, their previous outing ‘Double Figure’ demonstrated the influence of ambient post-rock and crazed digital funk on their work. ‘Spokes’ takes this even further, and they’ve had few finer moments than when ‘Crumux Rins’ twists into crackling avant-techno beats and shimmering synthetic bleeps.

Far more upbeat than past form, helmsmen Ed Handley and Andy Turner seem to be enjoying themselves above all, and even if Aphex’ ‘Selected Ambient Works’ remains the blueprint for much of Warp’s output, at least Plaid have the decency to make it their own. Few other electronic artists are pushing the envelope as successfully as Plaid, and for all the skull-****ery of Autechre, there remains only a small number of avant-garde mentalists creating anything you might actually want to listen to on a quiet night in. With this in mind, it’s worth mentioning that ‘Spokes’ is the most fun you can have with a surreal techno record made by reclusive obsessives since ‘Do You Know Squarepusher’. Hunt this down and cherish it.