Available on: Planet Mu 12″

‘Sacred Frequency’

In the press release for Room(s), Machinedrum’s forthcoming album for Planet Mu, much is made of footwork’s influence on the record. And yes, those rapid successions of 808s that seem to hang in the air are definitely present. But there’s also, as pre-album EP Sacred Frequency proves, a lot more to it.

Machinedrum’s an artist in the Aphex Twin mould: restless, prolific, and always searching for something new in himself, though whether that new is modern or old is neither here nor there to him. And so, on Sacred Frequency we get four different sides of Machinedrum: airy pop painted in big bold colours (‘Sacred Frequency’), manic, intricate hardcore (‘Fantastix’), and footwork that’s both playful (‘Flycatcha’) and eerily ice cold (‘Listen 2 Me’). It’s all, as you’d expect from Travis Stewart, impeccably produced and harmoniously coherent; if there’s one criticism to be made though, it’s that like the equally adaptable MIllie and Andrea, when you suggest that each track represents a one-off experiment for the artist to be swiftly moved on from, it’s less likely to stick in your memory too.

Elon Gats