Now You See

Four Tet “Planet”

Most of the Four Tet songs that I love are very similar, and are built around a tiny clip of the human voice looped at an interval that feels much slower than the actual tempo of the music. The sample in “Planet” seems to hover gently in midair as the percussive and melodic parts move along busily. It sounds very urban to me, like the feeling of moving in a slight daze through crowded, busy public spaces. I’m sure very commuter is well acquainted with this sensation, and in my experience it can be sort of satisfying. Physically alert, but mentally checked out. Moving in sync with everyone else while lost in your own head.

Buy it from Bandcamp.

Knifeplay “Greasr”

guitar that thuds along in a way that’s both hazy and overbearing, the muffled yet sensual coo of a human voice that’s almost completely drowned out by the volume of the guitar. But the key difference in this composition is the addition of what I must assume is some sort of keyboard making strange, expressive, high-pitched sounds that would work pretty well as the “voice” of a new droid in Star Wars. It knocks the song off-kilter, and serves as an odd and playful contrast to the bombastic heaviness of the guitar.

Buy it from Bandcamp.