Don't worry it's not your internet connection giving you a hard time, the video for "Plurals", as well as the song itself, actually begins that way. Come to think of it Patten's choice to use this generation's nuisance in experiencing media, i.e. bandwidth stalling while streaming, was a timely one. Many have creatively manipulated the overcompression effect of bad quality MP3s, but to our knowledge no one has used online streaming problems (the latest and biggest trend in listening to audio) as a source for music. However, Patten doesn't stop here...when we grew up CD skipping was the main issue (Gold Panda used this effect musically on his brilliant "Quitter's Raga"), yet later in the song he goes even further back in the history of audio technical problems, using cassette tape creasing, a wonderfully nostalgic effect (used by Boards of Canada on many of their tracks), on his wobbly and shakey lead synth line. From our description you might have already realized we're talking about an experimental track, yet you might not know that the music of Patten is grounded in techno. His latest album "GLAQJO XAACSSO" on the No Pain in Pop label, is the kind of experimental techno pioneered by Autechre and currently spearheaded by the likes of Actress, whose work we are particularly fond of right now. If you want to read our view on this exciting new direction of electronic music head over to our recent relevant post. Or you could experience the audio/visual cutting edge of this sound below:
This has got the perfect mix of weird and fun going on for me.
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