Autechre

The intricate digital tones and scattered synths that fill Autechre’s elaborate sequences are for “people who can handle ambiguity without losing it”. This is how Sean Booth perceives his listeners. Speaking with me about the forthcoming release, Quaristice, Booth admits the project was deliberately uncertain in its approach. “Because we were doing a lot of the tracks live we probably weren’t considering as much” he says, signifying the purity of the moment and the essence of Quaristice. “I don’t know what goes on unconsciously – is it feeling, is it just unconscious thought or what the fuck? I don’t think anyone really knows. When you’re doing live stuff you don’t really get much time to think. You just do it”.

Booth adamantly eschews all standard formation techniques when dealing with thematic ideas. Instead, he allows the landscape to permeate his thoughts. “Sometimes I do tracks for people, places, vibes or a situation. Sometimes I’m just drawing on lots of those to try and create an imaginary one. A bit like dreaming”.

Quaristice is the ninth album release for Booth and his working partner, Rob Brown, meaning collaboration is now almost second nature. “There’s benefits in that familiarity. The last album was about a third each and a third with us together. This album was almost all done with us in the same room. It took a bit longer but the method was quite different”.

Running most of their equipment in Realtime, the duo built up momentum as they worked on this project. And when they worked apart, they were still mostly together. Extolling the wonders of the internet, Booth points out how they “quite often start stuff, then send it to each other. I can be running stuff live on Realtime, stream it to Rob, who can then check it and have input over the phone”.

The end product carves out an abstract, fragmented, complex and severe soundscape and emphasises the importance of tools in technique. “We spend all our time working but our view on it is extremely untheoretical” admits Booth, continuing, “it’s all based around experience of process”.

Autechre’s meticulous fusion formation is constantly at the whim of the unconscious mind. This is why the near-infinite range of their instruments is so intergral to their music. “You don’t always get on with the gear. You have to like it. If you were pushed, you could probably make music using an old shoe. But it’s nice to feel an affinity with the thing that you’re using. I quite like the setup that we’ve got at the moment because there’s a lot of range and flexibility. I feel that we haven’t really exhausted it”.

It was the pair’s fascination with 80s hip hop production that influenced their lean towards structured rhythms and dissected analogue resonance. Before closing, Booth muses admiringly, “they were all using the same old crap drum machines and effects units but in wildly different ways. It was nowhere near as conservative as it is now. 80s hip hop was really pushing it. People don’t realise how brutal the ‘Breaking Bells’ dub is, the edit by Omar Santana. It would fucking kill people if they heard it now”.