Squarepusher Album: «Feed Me Weird Things»

- Customers rating: (4.4 of 5)
- Title:Feed Me Weird Things
- Release date:1999-01-05
- Type:Audio CD
- Label:Rephlex
- UPC:718752126120
- 1 Squarepusher Themeimg 6:25
- 2 Tundraimg 7:57
- 3The Swifty
- 4Dimotane Co
- 5Smedley's Melody
- 6Windscale 2
- 7North Circular
- 8 Goodnight Jadeimg 2:46
- 9 Theme from Ernest Borgnineimg 8:02
- 10U.F.O.'s Over Leytonstone
- 11 Kodackimg 7:15
- 12Future Gibbon
I bought this album in 1996 and instantly warmed to it. It was the first time I had heard drum 'n' bass warped so furiously into many different forms. Each track here is a different mood or style. 'North Circular' is intense and minimalist, 'Squarepusher Theme' is jazzy and funky, 'Tundra' and 'Theme from Ernest Borgnine' are beautifully melancholy, and 'Smedley's melody' is insanely fast and features the sound of a sheep being catapulted! The most amazing thing is Tom's fretless bass playing which features on most of the tracks, so deft and masterful. There is a wealth of ideas on this album which are so well executed it is a joy to listen to. If you are interested in Squarepusher and are wondering which of his records to buy, get this one. It's unlike anything else you'll ever hear and in my opinion the later Squarepusher albums do not gel quite as well.
Tom Jenkinson is so far out of drum n' bass. So it uses kinda weird production techniques and likes to play bass at, well, 400 bpm. But he's too accomplished of a jazz musician.... and too much of a cerebral freak.... to fit so keenly into the genre as some people expect.
This is a great album. It is one of the few classics of whatever genre you want to try to fit it into. Is it jazz? Yes, though not as much as 'Music is One Rotted Note'. Is it drum n' bass? Eh, it doesn't sound like Cujo or Plug or even Aphex Twin. It's got to be taken on its own level. And it's something that you have to grow into. If you give it time and listen to it for IT and not as some kinda archetype derived off of some other kind of music, it's almost holy.....
Between his somewhat dancy beats and his hardcore jazz breakdowns this has got to one of the best cd's that i have ever heard. This cd, if you read on the back, was soley responsible for the Richard D. James Album. Aphext Twin gave all the credit to Tom Jenkinson and then latter, Aphex Twin got all the credit for IDM. (...) I don't think anyone could touch Tom's style. Allot of people have recreated what Aphex Twin has done. Tom Jenkinson is by far the best bass player of my generation (and thats with Les Claypool taken into consideration). Buy this cd for yourself, your grandmother, your mailman. Everyone should have it.
I would like to tell the general public that their is an way to ease yourself into the intense, dense, complex world of Tom Jenkinson's Squarepusher. Sadly there is none. From there, Squarepusher's music is something that you like or you don't. Sure it takes some time to get past the opaquness of his work(some songs take some getting used to while others are almost immediately accessible), but if you can "get it", Jenkinson's "music" is some of them most rewarding IDM you can get into. That being said, Feed Me Weird Things is probably the best place to start for people with an itching to try Squarepusher.
First off, I have to say that Jenkinson makes some of the most detailed and intricate IDM this side of Autechre or Aphex Twin. Layers upon layers of manically crafted drum machines, basslines, and synths are assembled together richly and compellingly. But what separates SP from most artists of this ilk is the light-fast speed of which all of this is done at. Even its more meditated moments, FMWT never sits still for an instant, creating a difficult but involving listen. For what its worth you can never say what Jenkinson does it boring. What I find positivily fascinating is that he samples his own playing (and form the live instrumentation of Music is Rotted One Note, he is truly gifted musician), something really amazing. Another thing that seperates his debut from his later works is that it's a full pallet of what the man is capable of doing. Switching from noise, to ambient, to intense drill and bass, to break beat, even to jazz/fusion, sometimes all one track is truly amazing to listen to. However if there is one pitfall of this CD is that it feels more like a collection of songs rather then a complete work which keeps it from being the quality of Hard Normal Daddy, Music is One Note Rotted and Go Plasitc (which are all postitively brilliant by the way).
It would seem as though my praise for Jenkinson is non-ending so you would think that Squarepusher has rapidly become my new favorite artist. And while I love his work, I cannot say that I'm his biggest fan. But on the whole, I dare you to find an artist today that makes music as fasinating as Squarepusher. Its so different from everything else that it just begs to be listened to. Its certainly his most musical based work(some his latter work ventures in to pure noise territory), that alone makes it probably his most accessible work. If Squarepusher could ever be considered accessible....
The best album. ever. period. A rather bold statement, I agree, but this is just the way it is. Beautiful chors, distorted jazzbreaks: this album will never bore me. In my humble opinion, 'Tundra' is one of the best tracks ever made (to underline this statement: it will be played at my funeral, as well as 'Digeridoo' by Aphex Twin). If you like stuff by Aphex Twin, Bogdan Raczynski, Mu-ziq, D'atachi or even Venetian Snares, you've got to check this album.


