Plus (Autechre Album)

''Plus'' (often stylized as ''PLUS'') is the fifteenth studio album by British electronic music duo Autechre. It was released digitally with no prior announcement on 28 October 2020 through Warp Records. ''Plus'' was released twelve days after ''Sign'', the band's previous album. The album was released on physical formats on 20 November 2020. Critics noted that ''Plus'' took a more percussive approach compared to the duo's previous album. The cover and packaging artwork for the release was created by The Designers Republic.

Background

Similarly to the tracks on ''Sign'', the songs that ended up on ''Plus'' were recorded between 2018 and 2019 immediately after the duo finished touring, with production finishing up in February 2020. In an interview, Booth stated that he and Rob Brown hadn't shared any tracks with each other for "almost a year" before production started on the two albums. ''Sign'' and ''Plus'' were both teased prior to release in a series of Autechre live mix sessions that aired on streaming service ''Mixlr'' during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Composition

''Plus'' has been described as electronic, IDM, glitch, abstract and ambient. Critics noted that ''Plus'' was a lot more abrasive than ''Sign'' and featured more glitchy and percussive elements. In a review for '' Clash'', Nick Roseblade called the opening track "DeckDre Scap B" "ungainly and ill formed in places" and that it featured "scratchy percussion, juddering basslines, and haunting synths". Roseblade also discussed the closing track "TM1 open", the third longest song on the album, calling it a "slavering grating acid techno beast". Josh Sand of ''Beats Per Minute'' called the track "lux 106 mod" a "beatless utopian bubbling melody" and compared it to an orchestra tuning up. Sand also discussed the similarities in the track "ecol4" to the "hip-hop-infused days of 1997's '' Envane''".

In a piece for ''Exclaim!'', Peter Boulos commented on the "levitating and descending synthetics" of "7FM ic". Boulos also called the track "X4" "frantic" and described its "warped, acidic basslines" that "scaffold in unpredictable ways". Evan Snyder of ''Igloo Magazine'' compared the track "marhide" to a "surprisingly 808’ed kit drenched in static hiss, cowbell and all". Snyder also discussed "ecol4", commenting on its resemblance to a track on '' Confield''. ''AllMusics Paul Simpson described the album's opener "DeckDre Scap B" as a "series of splatters, stutters, and convulsions" held together by a faint pulse. Simpson also named the closer "TM1 open", referring to it as a "a fizzy whirlwind of twinkling notes and acid squirts".

Release

''Plus'' was released with no prior announcement onto digital streaming platforms on 28 October 2020 through Warp Records. This release came twelve days after the release of the duo's previous album, ''Sign''. Physical CD and 2xLP versions were released on 20 November 2020.

Critical reception

As with ''Sign'', ''Plus'' was met with positive reviews from critics. At Metacritic, which aggregates scores from mainstream critics, ''Sign'' has an average score of 82 based on 5 reviews, indicating "critical acclaim".

In an ''AllMusic'' review of ''Plus'', Paul Simpson concluded that the album's "greater focus on rhythm" holds the album together much stronger than ''Plus''. Reviewing the album for ''Beats Per Minute'', Josh Sand stated that while ''Sign'' was "probably the wise choice to release (and hear) first", the album was a "better microcosm" of the duo. ''Clash'' writer Nick Roseblade wrote that it was "unfair to compare ''Sign'' and ''Plus''", giving an example of the Radiohead albums ''Kid A'' and '' Amnesiac''. Sand concluded that both are "solid albums, but they aren't about similar things." Writing for ''Exclaim!'', Peter Boulos called ''Plus'' a "stronger example of Autechre's range than ''Sign''" and commented that any new music from the duo was "always a treat by any measure". Evan Snyder of ''Igloo'' said that the album "reads like a counterpoint to the prior album's emotive, warm and introspective narrative with its abstraction, playfulness and generative bounce."

Track listing

Charts

References

External links

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2020 albums
Autechre albums
Warp Records albums
Albums with cover art by The Designers Republic