Various Artists – Warp 10+3 Remixes [1999; Matador, Play It Again Sam, SMEJ Associated Records, Source, Warp Records, Zomba]

Pulling well-known and obscure base songs from Warp Records’ (at this point) decade-long catalog, this compilation features remix contributors to match, with results including Stereolab remixing Boards of Canada, Plaid remixing Autechre, Oval remixing Squarepusher, and so on for the rest of two CDs. With twenty-six tracks all together, the moods and styles jump all over their respective spectrums; however, despite the available options, Warp plays it safe by leaning on the big names of their stable for multiple base tracks (LFO gets top honors, with three songs to themselves and an opening mix track shared with Aphex Twin).

Chilled grooves are the main flavor, but some hyperactivity is common too, as breaks get jumbled and chopped, synth layers get tangled, and skittery percussion is flipped on and off for embellishment. Through it all, the mixing, production, and engineering maintain an impressively high polish, one which helps join the older material with the new in near-seamless fashion. As such, while the collection offers an interesting cross-section of how the Warp label developed over its first decade of existence, it takes some careful examination to really pull out that information from the mass of material. More obvious (and possibly more informative about Warp’s impact) are the remixers that appear, many of whom come from outside Warp’s usual line-up and signings. Though presented as one big block, it all flows together well, and the selections certainly paint Warp in a good light.

Here’s the alternate cover art.

Skinny Puppy – Last Rights [1992; Capitol Records, Nettwerk, Nettwerk Europe, Play It Again Sam]

Murky, discordant, and often agonized, Last Rights would be the last album from Skinny Puppy before the band’s complete disintegration (including the death of member Dwayne Goettel) on 1995′s The Process. With a focus on intensive layering, the songs tend to be virtual morasses of electronic and instrumental samples, with vocalist Nivek Ogre’s rasping, growling, and groaning (apocryphally under the influence of enough drugs to give him in-studio seizures) worming through the audio. Between bouts of harsh noise dissolution, the music drifts into more regulated rhythms, semi-discernible lyrics, and clearer sample sources, until the energy clots back up into further bursts.

But for all of the chaos and intentional disjointedness, the songs of the album flow together remarkably well, with the quick turns and disintegrating structures collapsing smoothly (relatively speaking) into each other. The frequent dives into portions without vocals tend to make it feel more fully-realized, oddly enough, with the final track, “Download” (substituted for the original last track due to sample copyright claims) following that path all the way into a side-band of the same name. While not as memorable in individual tracks as other albums in the group’s catalog, it does come off as an intensely earnest and effort-packed release, one which gels together with more effectiveness than any of their subsequent LPs.

Here’s the alternate cover art.

Another alternate.

And the reissue cover art.

Various Artists – Warp10+2 Classics 89-92 [1999; Matador, Play It Again Sam, Source, Virgin France S.A., Warp Records]

Collecting several of the singles from the first few years of Warp Records’ catalog, and presenting them in order of their positions in the label’s catalog numbers (not always matching up directly with actual release), this decade-anniversary compilation gives a quick run
(by omitting most of the remixes)

through those recordings and the way they defined Warp’s foundational style. In keeping with the label’s need to clearly demonstrate their approach, the bulk of the songs feature very clean production on their beats and synth-tones, along with fairly simple structuring of their house/techno patterns, with the most ‘cluttered’-sounding likely being the hip-hop-glazed “Hey! Hey! Can U Relate?” by DJ Mink.

Most of the other songs omit vocals entirely, which ends up being one of the main strains linking artists which stuck with the label as long-term attachments (e.g., Nightmares On Wax and LFO), those which had faded away or disbanded even before this compilation’s release (Sweet Exorcist), ones which eventually bounced to other labels (Forgemasters, Coco Steel & Lovebomb), and the groups which put just one or two singles to their name before disappearing (The Step, Tuff Little Unit).

The electronic nature of the music is another big link, of course, as are the extensive use of loops, the very nature of the hardware used at the time, and an undercurrent of funk, but picking out the particulars of style which separate the songs’ similarities is one of the collection’s more entertaining points of usage. Primarily a historical document, it also shows that the singles used to build Warp’s reputation had better-than-decent technique backing them up, even if the same can’t be said of the B-sides.