Best electronic albums of 2020: seven

7 – Plone– Puzzlewood (Ghost Box)

hello my name is baby fat roland and i like pooping my pants and putting lego up my nose

i like the sounds of plone's puzzlewood because some of it sounds like children's television and some of it sounds like speak & spell and some of it sounds like a 1970s sitcom montage and some of it sounds like cats

apparently it has been two decades since plone did anything, not that i know what a decade is because am a baby and i've barely grasped the concept of time

plone has taken the naïve novelty of 1999's playschool-flavoured for beginner piano and bolstered it with some serious tunesmithery and library music nous, for example watson's telescope is such a cheery earworm (a "cheerworm" if you will)

with puzzlewood highlights like the proggy mini-disco of day trip or the chaotic mario-run that is sarcelle, the baby really has grown up

what do these words even mean? i have a limited concept of language

 

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Best electronic albums of 2020: nineteen

19 – Dangerw*nk – Your Card Has Been Declined (Salmon Universe)

I've starred out part of Dangerw*nk's name because I'm pretty sure Blogger still has some unforgiving filters. Which is a shame, because the only danger here is listening to this album then exploding with sheer electronic joy.

Your Card Has Been Declined was the leftfield surprise of the year. In Electronic Sound magazine, I called this "Ulrich Schnauss for an Instagram generation". Bright electronic anthem after bright electronic anthem. I even liked the saxophone.

And what anthems. Woman Laughing Alone With Salad is a chocolate-sprinkled Sakamoto. An Attractively Priced Two Bedroom Flat In A Sought After Location is a new-born Plone, full of possibilities for the future. And yes, those are the real titles.

I do wonder if this album stayed under the radar for some people because of the ungoogleable name. Which would be a pity because this is an absolute d*light, a bright shining st*r in a dark year. Listen to it, you f*ckers.

 

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Bleep Years day one: Plone's Be Rude To Your School (1999)

Welcome to the first installment of Bleep Years in which I funnel entire years of my life through the narrow confines of single tunes.

1999: Plone's Be Rude To Your School

Plone were a one-hit wonder for Warp Records. They turned the ear of several national magazines when they released their debut single Plock, although it was probably an appearance on a Warp Records compilation that caught my attention. Their playful, playground techno was best summed up in Be Rude To Your School, a track on their 1999 debut album For Beginner Piano.

I still think it's one of the best techno pop songs, and it was a cheery addition to my DJ sets at the time. I'd become quite adept at beatmixing big beat and drum 'n' bass, and 1999 saw me pulling off long, technically involved sets. Amid all of this, though, was a frustration that beatmatching was not enough.

What I saw as a 'John Peel aesthetic', which puts the song before technical proficiency, meant that I started dropping in tracks that were impossible to beatmatch. This meant the complexities of Windowlicker, a classic single from 1999, and this catchy little track from Plone.

Be Rude To Your School sparks images of DJ venues and of friends in smoky bars. The turn of the century was very much about me learning to DJ beyond just keeping beats together. Plone, in that regard, made me a more playful DJ, a silliness I was to mine for many years to come.

2paW0r: The Warp Records anagram challenge

Here are 20 releases on Warp Records, all shaken up in a moment of anagram frenzy.

None of them are too obscure, although I reckon a lot of it is difficult (like the music!) and you pretty much need to be "into" your Warp to get them.

They include singles and albums by a variety of artists including Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Boards Of Canada and more. The numbers in brackets after each anagram indicate the number of words in the answer. Any punctuation you see isn't part of the anagram.

This is in celebration of pants-burstingly exciting Warp20 vote, some details of which can be found on the sidebar of this here website.

For example, for:
- No boring rape? Fine! (3)
the answer would be 'For Beginner Piano', the album by Plone (pictured).

Happy anagramming, and remember, it includes singles too. Pop your guesses in the comments (which should open in a separate window) and I'll 'fess up the answers in a few days. (Edit: Answers here.)

1 - Not tiresome seduction (5)

2 - Hurray! Knobbed! (2)

3 - A bawdy convoy (2)

4 - Enchant a dull head (2)

5 - Shams (1)

6 - Non-established chalk (5)

7 - Sells an ego (2)

8 - If sequencer (1)

9 - Damndest, elite nightshade! (5)

10 - The gormless kid (2)

11 - Is cocky dirt (2)

12 - No (1)

13 - Shock OK bet (1)

14 - Charmed tory (4)

15 - Flaky old ponce (2)

16 - Hence examined chews huge, inclement nail (5)

17 - Wiser, roughened toxin (3)

18 - Daring grunt, no? (2)

19 - As critique (1)

20 - OK ancient warmth (4)

(Answers here.)

Monthly mop-up: simmering Super Furries, dribbling confusion and net-loafing twazmuppets

Play with this cute flash synthesiser. Go on, have a play. Finished? Right then, stop faffing about and read my monthly mop-up for March.

What did I miss in March?

Probably quite a lot.  I should have mentioned Seeland, who are the blessed offspring of Broadcast (website graphic pictured) and Plone, and were tipped for great things in the second part of my 2009 preview back in January. Their music is bright, simple and gently experimental, like a simmering Super Furry Animals. Their debut album Tomorrow Today sounds like the 60s, the 70s and the 80s all at once.

I also ignored the Mark Pritchard single ? / The Hologram. It's his first release on brand spanking fresh Ho Hum label, and it's had some backing from Mary Ann Hobbs. ? is a dark drone that seems to momentarily peer at you from around the corner. The Hologram is a stolid slice of trip-hop that doesn't quite catch the spirituality of ?.

I also need to give you the latest goss on Luke Vibert.  The playground rave mentalist has stopped bathing in acid, and instead has lit up a massive doobie with some hip-hop inspired tracks - but that's for another post.

Can you recommend me some video action?

Yes. The massive, garguantuan, behemoth video superstar of March 2009 lived up to the hype. We've had mash-up vids before, but none has been as nose-breakingly effective as a collection of songs called Thru-You

Jerusalem-born Kutiman grabbed entirely unrelated snatches of other people's YouTube videos, cut them up, stretched them, sliced them, diced them and made love to them. The result is a collection of brilliant tracks that are so unlike their original source material, it renders all copyright arguments into a dribbling confusion. Watch the videos here.

And there was me thinking Radiohead on Mario Paint Composer would be the bestest video I saw this month.

Can I have an animal-themed link, please Mr Roland?

Grizzly Bear's impassioned plea, mentioned in my blog piece from a couple of weeks ago, reminded me of an interview the band did with Pitchfork last month in which Ed explained a shock Animal Collective leak and offered his thoughts on the death of the record buyer.  Read the short interview here. Album Veckatimest is out in two months.

What is a twazmuppet?

Tim Footman is a twazmuppet. Comment Is Free writer and Radiohead biographer Mr Footman had asked his Twitter friends to remind him to get on with some work and stop dabbling with social networking. It seemed like a sensible thing to do. So a few hours later, I messaged him:

"Get some shitting work done, you net-loafing twazmuppet."

'Twazmuppet' was a word I invented in my head months ago, but never had chance to use. So I yelled it at a poor defenceless author. Read Tim's reaction on his excellent blog here.

Tim Footman is anything but a twazmuppet. At least, I think he isn't. Can someone ring the OED to see if they've decided on a definition yet?

What's your favourite Warp track?

This is a question Warp Records are asking you, the general public. Go to their Warp 20 voting site and help celebrate the 20th birthday of the best record label of all time.

A mallet-pawing, arm-throating, wrestle-bashing preview of 2009 (part two)

I'd better get my 2009 preview finished before this whole New Year lark becomes unfashionable.

March.

Berlin adrenalin-techno kid (and former classical violinist, 'pparently) Tim Exile will plant his Listening Tree album.

The Future Sound Of London, whose artwork make gatefold vinyl a pleasure to ogle at, will play their first live date for over a decade at the Bloc weekender. It is unlikely to be as frenetic as Dan Deacon's live performanced.  Deacon counts a mallet among his percussion instruments, and has been taking to the stage with a synth-heavy 14-piece ensemble at recent gigs.  For that reason alone, seek out his new long-player Bromst.

Oh and former members of Plone and Broadcast have formed Seeland, who I reckon are a hot tip for 2009. When you clap ears on their debut album, you'll spot whispers of Stereolab and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.

The rest of 2009.

One of Paul Simon's favourite bands, Grizzly Bear should give Warp Records a new album in May, or thereabouts.  Speaking of Mr Simon, I still haven't forgiven the garfunkled-one for Graceland.  And while we're at it, I'm still boycotting Sly Stallone films for the travesty that is his 1996 movie Daylight.

If I kept my CDs on shelves, with my favourite artists on the higher shelves, and my least favourite artists on the lower shelves, Plaid would have their very own shelf about fourteen miles above my house. They are putting the finishing touches to their album Scintilli, and it will be released on Warp some time in the middle of the year.

In August, Orbital will morph together for their first live performance since John Peel's Maida Vale sessions, this time at the Big Chill. As I said in this post back in November, they have promised it won't be "an exercise in nostalgia". Of course, we all know it will.

Portishead ended 2009 without a record contract, so expect some In Rainbows-style tomfoolery with their fourth album. It should be out around September.

On a more commercial tip, ex-Pop Idol contestant (spit!) and new darling of the press Little Boots will claim 2009 as her own. She's worth watching because she uses a Tenori-on, which is a pretty Japanese music making box that lights up. The same people who rave about 'Boots enthuse about La Roux.

Finally, you may need to strap me down because I am insanely excited about one particular artist.  The Glaswegian Hudson Mohawke refers to everything as "shite" on his Myspace page.  He's not being negative: he's just being, well, Scottish.

Mohawke is a new signing to Warp Records, and he flips between electronica, hip hop, electro and soul in ways that really shouldn't be possible.

Someone somewhere labelled his music as "emotronic" (probably H-Mo himself).  He's working on an album which should sound a little like this: