3 out of 5

Label: Warp

Produced by: Rob Brown and Sean Booth

I read the pretty unanimously glowing reviews for Autechre’s ‘Plus’ – part of a pair of linked albums released nearly side-by-side in 2020 – and it’s clear that I’m not getting it. That “it” may be whatever has kept me from actively collecting the glitchy experimentalism of duo Rob Brown and Sean Booth, which started closer to the mid-90s beat-heavy sounds of some other Warp mainstays, but has evolved – admittedly very intriguingly – into its own breed of minimalism and ambience over the years. While I think that direction has allowed Autechre to carve out a very particular sound, there’s always been an element of coldness to their music that kept it more inaccessible to me. That block is still very much in place, doubled-down on with something as relatively chill as Plus, and thus making it hard for me to assess in the way a longtime fan might.

I do think the album is never boring. Plus’ nine tracks step between Radian-esque clipped electro and spaced out burbles of noise, which create a sense of space the more time (and volume) you give them. At the same time that space feels fairly empty, though its walls may form an interesting outline. This, I suspect, is where you can find a difference between someone into Autechre and someone – me – who only approaches them occasionally, as I had trouble sensing what the “point” was to longer tracks like ecol4, which clearly morph through different sections, but I couldn’t really assess to what effect, there being no real beginning or end or climax to the music.

And that was the case across the album. While I listen to my fair share of experimental, it’s fair to say I was more easily drawn in by Plus’ music when it was backed by something that made me bob my head, but perhaps the fact that such somethings came and went without fanfare also distracted me from being able to fully appreciate its subtler moments. There are a lot of conceptually interesting landmarks throughout, and the beats are well spaced so that, again, it’s never boring – you can’t just tune Plus out.

Whether or not you “get” it…?