- Spec: 2 x LP in paper inners, in 5mm outer sleeve with download card insert.

Tucked away in the great depths of the Warp catalogue is this elegant, liquid heartache of a record. An album credited to the late James Stinson, one half of cult-Detroit techno unit (alongside Gerald Donald) Drexciya, Lifestyles... stands as one of the remarkable records of the genre. Stinson died a year after release, lending this already beautiful work endless resonance.
Where the dystopian aqua-tronics of previous Drexciya were often jet-black, cold, brittle and abrasive this is a yearning soul music, played out down rain soaked streets, the buzzing lights of industry flickering in the darkness, the warm blue of a new day ready to break. This is a record where techno reached its raw, most emotive peak... Sustained pads paint minor-key melodies while electroid-vocals are buried deep in the hydrothermal mass of squelching bass-clusters and funky-filtered bleeps. At its skittering percussion core, a stripped back 808 tapestry, sequenced into myriad jazz-inflected shapes, a pulsing kick drum the snapping heartbeat, ticking hi-hats bursting from every angle.

All this tingles with the ghosts of records past, of Kraftwerkian humanoids, of first-wave Detroit, of refracted Hancock and Ayres, but as Stinson intones on the fifth track, ‘let me be what I wanna be’, Lifestyles is a creation all of its own special making, a sound that would inspire the latter day deep-house machinations of Omar S, Jus-Ed, Moodymann and influence –however indirectly- a wealth of current UK/US bass operators including Actress and Kyle Hall. More importantly it remains a beguiling epitaph to Stinson’s sadly distinguished life.

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Repress!

2x 12” 180g black vinyl
gatefold cover
mastered by Noel Summerville
original artwork by Theo Ellsworth.

A year on since the collaborative Mystic AM project in 2022, Rod Modell returns solo to Astral Industries with AI-35. The album - entitled 'Ghost Lights' - comes as a gatefold 2x vinyl LP, showcasing the latest epoch of Modell's signature soundscapes. Spread across four parts, 'Ghost Lights' draws out a wide, cinematic sound - with long arching contours, rippling textures and cavernous sound design.

Woven with layer upon layer of hidden fragments and supernal transmissions, each chapter takes the listener successively deeper into the twilight zone. Harking to dramatic off-world topographies and interstellar spaces, the work glistens with opulent sound treatment and monumental grandeur. Dense pulsations move with oceanic force, marked by washes of celestial light and subterranean drones. Exercising another side to Rod Modell's typically atmospheric productions, this album comes with an ambitious framework and a more assertive sound. Featuring some of Modell's most epic storytelling to date, 'Ghost Lights' delivers a powerful immersive experience.


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First time available on vinyl in 30 years.

Includes rare early tracks by Aphex Twin (as The Dice Man), Autechre, Richie Hawtin (as UP!), B12 (as Musicology) and Alex Paterson (The Orb), the latter featuring co-production from Jimmy Cauty (The KLF).

First release in Warp’s 1992 - 1994 Artificial Intelligence series that consisted of Artificial Intelligence, Surfing On Sine Waves by Polygon Window, Bytes by Black Dog Productions, Electro-Soma by B12, Dimension Intrusion by F.U.S.E., Ginger by Speedy J, Incunabula by Autechre, and Artificial Intelligence II.

Original gatefold sleeve reconstructed by The Designers Republic.
Album re-cut by Beau Thomas at Ten Eight Seven Mastering on classic black wax.

- Specs 1LP in gatefold sleeve, paper inner and download card insert

Tracklisting:
A1. The Dice Man - Polygon Window
A2. Musicology - Telefone 529
A3. Autechre - Crystal
A4. I.A.O - The Clan
A5. Speedy J - De-Orbit
B1. Musicology - Premonition
B2. UP! - Spiritual High
B3. Autechre - The Egg
B4. Dr Alex Paterson - Loving You Live

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Subb-an, Kepler & Wickham team up as 'Complex Phantasy' for an ep of warm club focused house music on leipzig's R.A.N.D. Muzik imprint.

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The first full-length studio album by Richie Hawtin, who was 22 years old at the time and living in Windsor, Canada. It was first released in June 1993 under the F.U.S.E. name on Hawtin’s own Plus 8 Records imprint and again on Warp Records as part of the ‘Artificial Intelligence’ series.
Remastered back in 2019, the reissue features original artwork from Richie’s brother, Matthew Hawtin.

Growing up in Windsor, Ontario, Richie Hawtin aka F.U.S.E. would make frequent excursions across the border to Detroit in search of record shops and new clubbing experiences. Soon he would take up a residency at the small subversive club The Shelter and develop his skills as a DJ. Together with his close friend John Acquaviva they launched Plus 8 Records in 1990 to release their own creations and to support other up-and-coming, like-minded techno producers who were in search of a musical home. Richie started recording under the cryptic alias F.U.S.E.- abbreviation for ‘Futuristic Underground Subsonic Experiments’ - and released seminal tracks like ‘F.U.’ and ‘Substance Abuse’ (1991). The From Our Minds To Yours compilations released on Plus 8 would make a mark on the developing techno scene in Detroit and beyond. At age 22 Hawtin released his first full-length studio album under his F.U.S.E. pseudonym. Dimension Intrusion was largely inspired by science fiction films and a collection of available vintage synthesizers and drum machines. Playing with their electronic yet warm sound effects, the young producer in turn discovered some of his favourite instruments. His heady manipulations of the Roland TB-303 acid sound helped develop an influential style that would have a lasting impact on electronic music. The tracks on Dimension Intrusion range from club focused techno to soundtrack ambience and can be seen retrospectively as experiments leading to what would soon become Hawtin’s trademark acid-laced Plastikman sound.

- Spec Black 2LP Vinyl in polylined inner sleeves in wide spine outer sleeve with 12” poster insert

[4th October 2023] Today, Warp announces reissues of two more albums from their Artificial Intelligence series: Dimension Intrusion by F.U.S.E. (aka Richie Hawtin) and Ginger by Speedy J. Both records were originally released in 1993, and these new vinyl editions mark their 30th anniversary.

Although unique records by distinctive artists, there are some strands that tie the two albums together. Dimension Intrusion was the fifth album in the Artificial Intelligence series, originally released on 7 June 1993, whilst Ginger was the sixth album in the series, coming out two weeks later on 21 June. Whereas the rest of the series focused on elevating underground electronic producers from the UK such as Autechre, B12, Black Dog Productions and Polygon Window, these two entries in the series added an international dimension, representing North American and Northern European takes respectively on the techno genre. Both albums were also released in Canada on Richie Hawtin’s own fabled Plus 8 label, with Paap putting out a domestic edition of Ginger in the Netherlands on his Beam Me Up! imprint, echoing the accidental Star Trek reference in Warp’s own name (actually a shortening of original name Warped). Both artists would go on to record for NovaMute, a dance music subsidiary of Mute Records.

The concept that unites this music above all however is the idea of crafting electronic music for home listening, charting the evolution of a musical form that had started out purely dancefloor-focused. Both Paap and Hawtin had started to make tracks with this idea in mind independently, and it chimed perfectly with the series that Warp founders Rob Mitchell and Steve Beckett were putting together concurrently to showcase exactly this development. The compilation that gave the series its title and kicked things off, housed in a striking sleeve featuring a robot reclining in an armchair, surrounded by album sleeves, succinctly communicated the central idea with a certain amount of tongue-in-cheek humour. It was after Paap had contributed to Artificial Intelligence with Speedy J’s “De-Orbit”, alongside Richie Hawtin making an appearance using his UP! pseudonym, that Mitchell and Beckett invited them to come on board to the series with full artist albums for release on Warp.


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The inspiration for ‘Skin Breaker’ comes from my early years of watching sci-fi films. Howard has always been fascinated by them . As a huge fan of 80s beat tracks and 80s sci-fi, Howard aimed to blend those influences into this project. This project is a tribute to the sounds and styles that have inspired him.

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