Squarepusher: Just a Souvenir
Squarepusher: Just a Souvenir
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Monday, 13, Oct 2008 04:30
Warp, out now.
In a nutshell...
A welcome return to past form.
What's it all about?
Following 2004's Spinal Tap-esque jazz odyssey, Ultra Visitor, Squarepusher tones down the self-indulgence a notch for his latest release, Just a Souvenir.
Based on a recent daydream of Jenkinson's, this concept album documents the performance of a "crazy, beautiful rock band". Its 14-track running length covers an impressive amount of territory, swaying effortlessly from genre-to-genre, but always staying true to its dance roots.
Who's it by?
Dorset-born Tom Jenkinson has experimented with more genres than you've had hot dinners over the past 15 years. From acid jazz to post rock to cut-and-past glitchcore, it's always anybody's guess what Jenkinson is going to spit out next. Renowned for his inhuman genius behind a bass guitar, Squarepusher isn't afraid of getting funky when needs must.
Like Warp Records label-mate, Aphex Twin, Squarepusher's public persona is consistently elusive. What is for certain though is that this limelight evading producer has attracted an impressive roster of celebrity listeners, including Thom Yorke, OutKast's Andre 300 and art house director, Sofia Coppola. I know all this because it says it in the press release.
As an example...
Not many lyrics here, I'm afraid. Not intelligible ones anyway. Open Society and A Real Woman contained a few garbled, robotronic snippets of - what I can only presume is - Jenkinson trying to sing. Probably not worth transcribing.
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
Not unless they've started handing out complimentary ecstasy and nitrous oxide down the red carpet.
What the others say
"Dangerously close to wandering too far into Jenkinson's day-dream, leaving the rest of us looking on as he noodles away on the bass in rapture." - Sam Draper, Noripcord.
"Truly of psychedelic nature with sparkling notes in a kaleidoscope of white, red, green, blue and yellow" - Headphone Commute, Gridface
So is it any good?
Many thought that the turning of the millennium had blown Squarepusher's circuits. After the glitchy flex-outs of the 1990s, such as Go Plastic! and Harder Faster Daddy, Jenkinson came back post-Y2K with Feed Me Weird Things - an album with all the charisma of tomato soup - and Ultra-Visitor, essentially one massive jazzw*nk for cigar aficionados.
Praise the Lord though, because Just a Souvenir is an exhilarating and perplexing return to form. All of the pops, clicks and garage flicks we loved about 90s Squarepusher are here, while the more successful elements of his jazz experimentations - namely the porn grade synthesisers - have been retained.
Just a Souvenir is at its colourful pinnacle when it's at its most chaotic; when Jenkinson lays off manically fiddling his bass for a minute and starts cranking all the fuzzy bleeps and pops out his sonic arsenal of studio equipment, which has no doubt taken a beating over the years.
While the detours of Jenkinson's day dream, such as Yes Sequitur, may often seem like they're more for his pleasure than the listeners, they remain satisfyingly intriguing.
For all of Just a Souvenir's technical gusto and graft, I can't help but feel that Squarepusher's era has been and gone. It sounds great - for sure - but the concept is not the revolution-on-the-dance floor it once was. While Squarepusher has once again found his feet in the genre, the genre itself is now confined to a wheelchair. With dance music progressing to exciting new destinations - from Burial to Scotch Egg - it may just be that no matter what Squarepusher does, he will never be able to recapture the abrasive thrill that made him such a terrifying innovator in years past.
7/10
Daniel Shane