Warp Records present the BBC Radiophonic Workshop?

A dusty tape among scores stored in an attic has just blown apart the entire history of dance music.

Among the possessions of Delia Derbyshire (pictured), knob twiddler for the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, was the recording of an experimental dance piece that simply should not exist.

It sounds like the sort of thing you would expect from Aphex Twin, Massonix or Sabres Of Paradise, yet it was recorded in the late 60s.

As a piece of production well ahead of its time, it has the same woo factor as Pink Floyd's On The Run, or The Beatles' Tomorrow Never Knows.

And yet it's more advanced than those pieces, as though some beardy electronica fellow is messing about with a TARDIS and not telling us.

"That could be coming out next week on Warp Records," bleeps ex-Orbital man Paul Hartnoll, who, incidentally, did a cracking cover version of the Workshop's Dr Who theme tune.

Decide for yourself - jump to Delia Derbyshire's experimental 'dance' track on this BBC news piece.

Reviews: Massonix, Paul Hartnoll & Reload

Artist: Massonix
Title: Subtracks (album)
Label: Skam
[site] [listen]
Suitably for a new year post, have a fattening dollop of nostalgia. 808 State's Graham Massey has splurged out a full album of his aquatic-themed side project and it sounds like, um, 808 State. It boasts the same analogue complexity and rolling, melodic scrumptiousness - not a million miles from Two Lone Swordsmen. It's like being back in the 1990s except without James Bond films and Teletubbies.


Artist: Paul Hartnoll
Title: Patchwork Guilt (single)
Label: Kids
[site] [listen]
This may be on a minor label, but this is one half of collosal uber techno monster Orbital taking his baby solo steps. Minimal and slightly absurd, this is confident melodic electro that sounds like, um, Orbital. It's reminiscent of In Sides, but not as smashing. Maybe we need a full album before Hartnoll can un-doff his Orbital hat. This is like being back in the 1990s, but without Friends and dial-up internets.

Artist: Reload
Title: Various titles (EPs)
Label: Evolution
[site]
Before music was invented, Tom Middleton and Mark Pritchard helped birth modern electronica with their Evolution label. These re-releases remind us how radical, raw and revolutionary the Middleton / Pritchard partnership was. This is simple, unpretentious old-fashioned techno. It's just like living back in the 1990s, except without the corporate takeover of raves and the bloody Star Wars revival.

It's a project; it's in a warehouse

Time for a Fat Roland night out! Sequence held part two of their Warehouse Sessions last Friday, featuring Autechre, LFO and Massonix, with support from DJs Surgeon, Rob Hall and residents Mark Turner and the Computer Controlled DJs.

Fil and I arrived in the pouring rain at Boddington's Brewery, which has been converted into a haven for lightstick-waving gurners. The Warehouse Project is a great name for the venue on two counts: (1) it's in a warehouse and (2) it is a project, so it won't last forever.

Unusually for us, we got there too early. This is okay because as middle-class toffs, we would have been mortified if we had arrived too late for the watercress sandwiches and the green tree and stilton soup.

>Arms & legs

After wasting time thinking about how we were going to last 'til six in the morning, we each cut off an arm and a leg for a three-quarter pint of beer. It was cheaper to buy a meal than drink a beer.

Half way through the night, we bumped into two guys who were here for the house music night next door. We invited them into our techno ghetto, but they said something along the lines of they would rather cheese-grate their eyeballs whilst being fed their own liquidised fingers. Or they said they'd rather hear music to dance to. One or the other, not sure which.

Apparently, Maggot from the Goldie Lookin Chain was there. This is a random fact and had no bearing upon our evening.

>Rita

I'd better talk about the music. The soundsystem is notoriously quiet, but I expected as much, so I wasn't disappointed. Unlike a few months ago when I went to Alton Towers to find Rita was shut. I mean, really.

I hadn't heard Graham Massey's Massonix before, but I was more than au fait with his 808 State beat combo. It was much of the same: rich, complex, beautiful, a man clearly enjoying throwing everything into the mix and smoothing it over with analogue fuzziness.

>Lazers

LFO were suitably over-serious, with monotone visuals reacting to every metronomic bleep. But the highlight for me was Autechre. Accompanied by a great lazer show (wooo!), their usual fare of disjointed percussion and clattery clicks sounded absolutely fabulous darling. You could hear every whir and every spap. ("Spap" is the only way I can describe Autechre's sound sometimes.)

I didn't gurn, nor did I wave a light stick, but it was nice to hear some top quality electronica / IDM at a gig for a change. And this is someone who went to Take That earlier in the year, so I know me gigs, me.