Gaseous Opal Orbs, by Fluorescent Grey (CD on Record Label Records)

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This record left our Ant feeling ecstatic.

I'm sick of reading shit like "Oh electronic music is dead, everyone has done it all already" The kind of people that spout this garbage are spoon fed. Look to the underground, and as with any sub-culture the ideas are both thriving and inspiring... Yep so It's Ant here absolutely bursting with excitement that a box of Fluorescent Grey CD's have just arrived from the good people at Record Label Records. I've been waiting for 'Gaseous Opal Orbs' for a while now ever since the 'Lying On The Floor Mingling with God In a Tijuana Motel Room Next Door To A Veterinary Supply Store' disc blew my mind. A download only album (Asian Woman Mummy In My Tummy) kept me going during the wait. I have a particularly fond memory of listening to a track from that download, that had a title something like 'Moth Cocoons' and I was listening to it on crowded metro train and imagined I was in a cave with the passengers being giant moths. Yes Robbie Martin's music will certainly take you places. A serial prankster, true master of his machines and somewhat of a synthesis virtuoso. The cliche "Music is the Drug" can truly be applied to this album. The words Psychedelic and electronic music often are naively associated with bad trance music. This mans work and this CD are what can be called truly psychedelic music. A sublime and captivating journey into his cerebral cortex and into his world. Sonically, in the more stripped down freaky elements I'm reminded of Coil's abstract non Balance vocal pieces. With track titles like 'Chrono-Synclastic Infundibulum' I want some of what he's on...The layers of innovative rhythms on the more percussive tracks just weld together magnificently.The arrangements can be complex, difficult, paranoid, euphoric, organic, meticulously detailed, groovy, fucked up, accessible, the whole shebang.The album has tribal sounds, dub sounds with the most futuristic, vivid sound design and sonic sculptures you'll here at the moment. Relentlessly inventive, experimental, quirky, abstract....you'd be forgiven for thinking 'Physically Modelled Theme For Children' was snatching a Prince Jammy sample, yet the sounds are entirely original. A homage to the great dub producers and a vision further into the sound of future dub. 'Pallate Swap Dub' initially sounds like Terry Riley at the age of 3 then mutates into a post Aphex childlike lost dream. 'Celtic K-hole' really changes the mood with it's celtic folk sounds and turntableist scratches. A refreshing outburst that breaks thing up wonderfully like a vignette from the Black Dog's Spanners with a whimsical, mystical magic spell. Finally 'Are you Aware Of The Pink Light Emanating From Your Navel' ends proceedings in a lush hazey dreamy way like a reprise of all you've heard before, familiar yet new.I'm truly lost for words. Robbies passion for sound and technology really comes across in his music and is truly inspirational stuff. I'd call 'Gaseous Opal orbs' a cool, more underground alternative to the latest Autechre album. Fluorescent Grey is your drug and I'm your pusher. These twisted funk and off the planet sound worlds come highly recommended.

Lying on the Floor by Fluorescent Grey (CD, £6.99)