Squarepusher – Music Is Rotted One Note

I never quite understood this LP back in the day as a twenty something year old, I listened to it a handful of times and then quietly filed it under leftfield drill n bass in the collection. Having revisited all these years later, i can appreciate whats going on - top draw jazz vibes! The drum programming is very organic as well and no doubt contributes to the Miles comparisons. The pressing and mastering is also excellent highly recommended

I actually bought this in 1998 instead of Boards Of Canada's "Music Has The Right To Children"

One of few times I agree with Muzik magazine, that a recording deserves one out of five stars. When buying Apples, I don't want Oranges.

"Don't Go Plastic" yet in 2001 he did "Go Plastic"

If this is Jenkinson's take on "Bitches Brew", at least Davis' album had fantastic artwork, something to put on the wall. MIRON looks like it was made in Poland 1983.

My main issue is that it has been done before, by the likes of Jaco Pastorius. When buying Warp records, I want the future, not the past.

Jesus christ can Warp just go and reissue this and Go Plastic and Burningn'n Tree now I dont want to have to wait another year!!!!!!

People comparing this to Bitches Brew are crazy. The vibe is similar but impossible to compare this (great) work to an monolithic, awe-inspiring experience like bitches brew.

The one-man Drum'n'Bass outfit 'Squarepusher' aka Tom Jenkinson treads upon more unpredictable terrain on 'Music Is Rotted One Note'. Although the album still contains elements of his usual Drum'n'Bass sound, this is by and large is a jazz/fusion affair.

Jenkinson does a great job playing all the instruments live and by himself, and perfectly re-creates the funky atmosphere of such early-'70s Miles Davis classics as Get Up With It and On the Corner.

Jenkinson's performances throughout the vinyl are both flawless and inspired -- he obviously realized that if he were to pay tribute to Miles, nothing but the best would do. Davis' spirit lives on in such tracks as "Don't Go Plastic," "Dust Switch," "137 (Rinse)," and "Theme From Vertical Hold," while "My Sound" perfectly captures the essence of Miles' calming and reflective compositions. But don't be misled; this is not a by-the-numbers rip-off of Miles Davis. Jenkinson updates these familiar sounds with '90s recording techniques and injects enough of his own style into the mix to keep it recognizable. Miles would be proud.

This happened to be my first foray into the world of Squarepusher... Odd introduction since it is not representative of what he is known for. I’d read an article back in ’99 in a local newspaper about a new “folk” drum & bass album with Miles Davis Bitches Brew-era stylings—an album wherein the artist chose to perform all his material live, without any sequencing. Within the drum & bass community, it was unheard of to actually perform on real instruments. Even if a musician did play their own instruments, the material would be sampled and spliced into breaks—a practice of sampling one’s self. Liz Copeland, the author of this article, commented, “It’s an idea that probably seems as blasphemous to drum ‘n’ bass gurus as to the folk community when Bob Dylan first picked up his electric guitar”. This article sparked my interest and influenced me to check it out, but at the same time, was misleading because, to my disappointment, this really didn’t sound like drum & bass at all.

Let me just say you will not find any breakbeats or really any reference to his rave culture roots here. This album is pure, raw musical expression existing mainly in the avant-garde jazz idiom. Initially, I assumed these pieces to lack form, devoid of any true melodies that could be followed or enjoyed. And it took me a few years to understand the early experimental electronic music references (I had not been exposed to this type of music yet). But now! This album, for me, is pure genius and easily his best album in of replayability (is that a word?).

Each song is like an impressionistic sound-painting, evoking peculiar moods by using odd floating chords, strange watery atmospherics, obscured cryptic voices, and whatever other kinds of indefinable sounds he is able to conjure up. Most of the tracks are seemingly through-composed with free-jazz elements. Others have more in common with the output of academic tape music centers in the 1950’s. Time signatures are vague or non-existent, but still are enjoyable and easy to follow. This reminds me of a description of Tony Williams’ playing on Eric Dolphy’s album Out to Lunch. Of Williams, Dolphy says, “He doesn’t play time, he plays. Even though the rhythm section breaks the time up, there’s a basic pulse coming from inside the tune.” This can also be said of Squarepusher on this album: he plays what he feels.

Of the stand-out tracks, “My Sound” is probably the first great song you will latch onto, which seems to have more in common with the “post-rock” sound than the jazz-funk of the rest of the album. Beautiful electric piano motif with backing elements that build into a musical dreamscape. Right up there with “Iambic 9 Poetry”. But there are other less obvious favorites. Particularly “Circular Flexing” which gives the sense of an endless descent into the unknown. It reminds me of the Alice In Wonderland scene, falling down into that hole in slow-motion as Alice enters a new and strange world of imagination. “Shin Triad” is an interesting triptych of sound-ideas that would be welcome as a 10-minute excursion, but unfortunately ends up being rather short. “Last Ap Roach” is a horrific dirge with air-raid sirens that give me flashbacks of playing Silent Hill on the old Playstation. There are plenty of others, but you would just have to hear them. Descriptively, they are hard to pin down, other than saying they are jazzy.

Currently, having heard most of the Squarepusher catalogue, I would have to say there is no other album of his that captures the spontaneity and emotion this one does. Not to discredit his other works. There are other very far-out and mind-blowing “drill & bass” (I hate that label) pieces on other albums, but the intricate programming of machines takes time. Whereas here, he is just in the moment—a form of creativity you cannot capture with sequencing.

I really enjoy this album because in the context of Squarepusher's music release career, it's very contrarian to what Squarepusher listeners expect (hence the rhetorical question "Do You Know Squarepusher?").

Absent are the lightning-fast drum and bass sequences that made Squarepusher Squarepusher to most ears. Instead it is a Miles Davis early fusion work (a la Bitches Brew) except Tom Jenkinson is the entire "group." And here you see the foundation for the Squarepusher sound: jazz.

It's often pointed out that Tom Jenkinson was vehemently opposed to electronic music and was a highly disciplined and talented jazz musician (drums and bass in particular). It wasn't until Richard D. James (yes, the same Aphex Twin) warmed him up to electronic instruments and sequencers. Thus his f***ing sound consists of boxes that would be of a Miles Davis group if he had lived to the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st century.

But this album shows more explicitly the roots of that sound. Here drums are real and played by a human being. Yet in spite of its slower-than-normal-Squarepusher tempo, you can't help but be entranced by its groove (and try playing it yourself too). You can hear melody in his bass playing and harmony in his keyboard. You can also hear colourations of the sound. It's a mousse cake that you can finally savour instead of feeling like it's being fed to you in chunks through a Gatling gun.

While I've come to hear other Squarepusher albums, this holds a special place being that it was my first one, the one that got me more interested in the Warp label and the one that veered me into knowing about jazz. Music may be "rotted one note" but you cannot help but be enamoured by it.

"Music is Rotted..." sounds like Miles Davis' "Bitches Brew," summed up into one double-sided LP, and all written, performed and produced by one man. Even Miles would be in awe of Jenkinson's work here. Amazing spacey/ambient jazz with occasional noise seem to describe this album well. Jenkinson really displays his talents on (real)drums and (real)bass, as I think that I can safely say that jazz beats and tempos are some of the more difficult to master, especially on drums. I'd be quite satisfied if he just kept releasing albums like this one.

Congratulations, Mr. Jenkinson. This is one of the best ever released records on WARP. It's sounds so true, so fresh and interesting. This is real JAZZ!

Here is an item which is adding itself to the great releases of Warp like "Smoker's Delight" , "Incunabula" , "I Care Because You Do" and "Production Bytes" .