Music 101: The Bluffer's Guide to Electronica

The Bluffer's Guide is a personal musical journey through influential genres and artists with DJ and writer Aidan Kelly. This week, Aidan takes on the history of electronica...

From the same world as ambient, sound design and indirectly, jazz comes a sound that found its roots in experimentation, by people like Philip Glass, John Cage, Kraftwerk and (featured here) Jean Michel Jarre. Then, with his first releases Aphex Twin changed the atmosphere and the landscape.

Start to your new journey into the sounds of Electronica. Here are a few of my favourites...

Jean-Michel Jarre - Equinoxe, Pt. 5

The god of showmanship, with concerts that pre-empted the current norm in large-scale festival culture (3.5 million people at one concert in Moscow alone), JMJ was a master at the concept of electronica, space and the sound of a world beyond ours - with a stylish art department in tow, he looked and sounded sci-fi.

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Aphex Twin - Xtal

Whatever the landscape at this time with the explosion of acid house and rave culture, Richard D James had the thought to use commonly-used Roland preset sounds and hear them differently - he's the artist that everyone cites as the game changer.

Boards Of Canada - Sixtyten

With Boards Of Canada you get elusive, a Scottish electronic music duo consisting of brothers Michael Sandison and Marcus Eoin. I love Warp records, who signed these boys with their samples from old Canadian TV broadcasts and lazy beats.

Autechre - Slip

Speaking highly of Warp records, go down a rabbit hole with that label - it's extensive and don’t forget they’ve also branched out into film production, Autechre (pronounced awh-tech-reh) are Rob Brown and Sean Booth from Manchester. They’re the big brothers of the scene, with very complex layered compositions that test the nerves. Their 1994 album Amber is more accessible.

Casino vs Japan - It's Very Sunny

On a label called Wobblyhead, and then City Centre Offices comes Erik Kowalski from Milwaukee, his lovely album Go Hawaii is distorted and beautifully constructed at the same time, with lush melodies and strings that are equally ancient and box fresh. Formerly a fanzine writer, I believe that's his son sampled on the track.

Susumu Yokota - Kodomotachi

Sadly passed in 2015, Susumu Yokota was an excellent House DJ and producer who found time to produce a select ambient electronica sound that had an unmistakable Japanese influence.

Arovane - tascel_7

Discovering two record labels, DIN and City Centre Offices, nearly 20 years ago opened the doors for me on a new era of artists that included Arovane from lower Saxony, Germany with his melodic and structured sound. Also look out for Lilies, from 2004.

Lusine - Thick Of It

Ambient and electronica could easily be compared to film soundtrack or sound design, and this is the case for Texan Jeff Mcllwain under the guise Lusine. Signed to the highly regarded Ghostly recording label, this release in 2009 re-aligned the sound for me.

Plaid - CLOCK

From 2016 comes Plaid's 10th album The Digging Remedy - they're a duo from London who were also founding members of Black Dog, worked with Bjork, Goldfrapp and many others, highly visual within their intense live performances, Another Warp stablemate, this album's artwork was done in collaboration with Cabbibio. Clock is ecstatic and yet very Detroit...

Chihei Hatakeayama - Lone wolf in a heavy snow

During a demanding lockdown, I drifted away from electronica sounds and more into ambient - I probably need to do another show for that - and my saviour was this track in particular but from Chihei Hatakeayama's album Mist. He releases music out of Tokyo at a phenomenal rate, layering guitars for drone effect.

Listen to more from The Bluffer's Guide on RTÉ 2XM here.

Music 101: The Bluffer's Guide to Electronica

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