alt Hacker NewsThe depth of knowledge of Richard James surprises me every time I come across articles about him.
No wonder Aphex Twin's music stands out the way it does. He's always a fair way ahead of the curve.
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He is indeed a very technical and nerdy person. For example, he was an early adopter of the SuperCollider audio programming language.
Fun trivia: he was trolling the SuperCollider mailing list under the alias "eric hard jams" which is an anagram of Richard [D.] James. Some of his messages were truely horrendous and he got kicked out eventually. He is quite a character...
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Yes, not to long ago I was looking into the Easter egg in Windowlicker, amazing. https://eeggs.com/items/34824.html
> It’s very simple, but do you want your music to be based on an international standard or on what you think sounds right to you? [...] I’m very glad I trusted my instincts. Listening to that other voice is THE most important thing in creativity, whether you’re an engineer or a musician.
To me, RDJs music always stood out as having uncanny, unique melodies and harmonies. As a teenager I fantasized about him being some sort of benevolent alien music shaman, beaming melodies onto our planet.
Stuff on SAW II where you can't figure out if you're hearing single notes or mutating chords and everything is near-synaesthetic bliss. The wistful otherness of 'Italic Eyeball'. Whatever 'fingerbib', ICBYD, and things on Melodies from Mars are doing was very formative to my 16 year old brain.
It's clear that whatever he does, he channels some unique creative juices.