07. Autechre
Radio Slave
‘Windwind’
(Warp, 1993) — 11.15 minutes
The art of introspection is perfectly captured in this
slice of deep, touching, melancholic ambient techno
taken from Manchester duo Rob Brown and Sean
Booth’s ‘Incunabula’ album. One of Autechre’s finest
moments, it lasts much longer than that — undulating
between dark and light and hitting a squelchy, bleepy
breakdown just past half-way through that spooks out
before winding up again into mellow, 1990s ambient
techno bliss. Cut from
the same cloth as
Aphex Twin’s ‘Selected
Ambient Works II’ and
released at the height
of the first wave of
Warp releases, this
track stands out as
one of the finest in
that genre.
08.
Jaydee
‘Plastic
Dreams’
(R&S Records,
1993) — 10.35
minutes
When Dutch
house producer
Robin Albers
first released the
instrumental
house tune ‘Plastic Dreams’ under his new moniker
Jaydee, it went straight to No.1 on the US Billboard
dance charts. Its unique twist was its Hammond
organ-style synth melody. It quickly became an
early house anthem that just kept getting remixed
(check the Rhythm Masters version) and adapted
via cheeky white label bootlegs to make it work
and work again on the dancefloor. The single was
DJ Robin Albers’ first release and, because of its
success, he immediately started a label called First
Impressions, though nothing he did after ‘Plastic
Dreams’ achieved that same level of success. The
long version of the tune is hard to get hold of on
vinyl now. Otherwise you can easily grab a taste of
‘Plastic Dreams’ in its many versions.
09.
Ricardo
Villalobos
‘Fizheuer
Zieheuer’
(Playhouse, 2006)
— 37.09 minutes
Based on a horn
sample taken from
a gypsy folk song titled ‘Pobjednicki Cocek’ by Serbian
group Blehorkestar Bakija Bakic, this minimal techno
tune builds and builds in a slow, hypnotic groove.
Spread over two sides of vinyl, this 4/4 mega-track
hits a high point on the first side with a horn fanfare
before heading into a 20-minute percussive chug-athon on the second side. After it was released, Chilean
producer Ricardo Villalobos said his inspiration to
make ‘Fizheuer Zieheuer’ came after listening to
Manuel Göttsching’s ‘E2/E4’.
066 djmag.com.au
The idea of an endless track hadn’t started there.
In the 1950s, Stockhausen was making 45-minute
long, experimental beatless tracks that filled one
whole side of a record. In the 1970s rock band
Yes, headed up by Rick Wakeman, were doing the
same thing.
And then, in the 1970s, Giorgio Moroder took that
concept and applied it to music with sequenced
beats, creating extended, synth-driven opuses
such as Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love’ and ‘The
Chase’ that were perfect for discotheques, where
people danced all night to music segued by DJs
into a seamless mix.
‘I Feel Love’, weighing in at 16 minutes and 50
seconds, still sounds fresh now, nearly 40 years
after it was first made.
A few years after ‘I Feel Love’ was released, in
1981, Manuel Göttsching, the then-frontman of
krautrock band Ash Ra Tempel, wanted to make
a long piece of music he could listen to while he
was travelling. He called the hour-long piece of
music he composed ‘E2-E4’. This improvised piece
combined synths, guitar and keys in a minimalist
groove that went on to become an underground
club anthem in Europe and America after it was
released in 1984. A few years later, the tune was
re-worked by Italian production outfit Sueno
Latino for their eponymous tune that became a
rave-era, Balearic classic.
‘E2-E4’ left a legacy that echoes through
productions we all still dance to today, penned
by artists as diverse as Ricardo Villalobos and
Basic Channel. Danny Tenaglia infamously played
Göttsching