2 – Plaid – The Digging Remedy (Warp Records)
I was the first person to review the new Plaid album, right here on this very website. Well, sort of. It was more of a guarded comment so I didn't spoil my full review in issue 21 of Electronic Sound - in which I lauded the work having "more hooks than an angler’s tool box". Still, the Plaid chaps noticed.
@FatRoland Wow, thanks ! 😊 This is the first feedback we've had on the album as a whole other than from friends. Seen this @thebeedrones ?— Plaid (@Plaid) May 30, 2016
Bless their, er, plaid socks. The Digging Remedy is more accessible than most of their previous 11 albums. The scratchiness is still there, as are their trademark chord sequences. You can recognise Plaid's sound a mile off. But it's smoothed out, all guitar-glistened and melodic. This is Plaid at their cheeriest, yet still, closer Wen made me well up.
To be truly understood, Plaid have to be seen live. At their Manchester gig earlier this year (pictured above), they became the absence of triangles in one of the cleverest visual set-ups I've seen for a while. As they were in the middle of their cute-as-a-button Melifer, the bloke next to me exclaimed "I didn't know they did songs like THIS."
"THIS" being an older Plaid, more thoughtful, but still willing to kick it out of the park with the towering Yu Mountain and the trippy confidence of CLOCK. This album was my companion throughout my short Edinburgh Fringe run. A proper friend. And their best album since their early days.
Stream Do Matter here.
Scroll all of the best 2016 electronic albums by clicking here.
