Alog, Amateur (Rune Grammofon)

Apparently composed with instruments they battered together themselves, Alog’s new album is an unexpected delight, betraying a depth only hinted at previously.  Alog’s previous three albums on Rune Grammofon are precise abstract electronic affairs which never entirely escape the atmosphere of the beat, but Amateur has a ramshackle found sound charm which defies all scientific principle to propel it skywards.

The new Alog find themselves appending Robert Wyatt soundy-likey vocals to the coda to“Write Your Thoughts In Water”, sprinkling twinkly percussion and fragments of words all over “Son Of King” (reminds me very much of one of Matmos’s surgical splice exercises), clip-clopping and strumming through “A Throne For The Common Man”, and recording their “Sleeping Instruments” for their own three-quarter length 4’33’’.  “The Beginner” sounds a lot like a more organic version of (my favourite track of theirs) “St Paul Sessions II” from Miniatures, all relentless desparate alarm guitar chime, while the ten minutes of “Bedlam Emblem” sounded even more claustrophobic and panic-inducing when I managed to get myself trapped inside my duvet cover a few moments ago.

This has actually been on sale over at Rune Grammofon for a few weeks now, bedecked in a typically pretty Kim Hiorthoy two-balloon sleeve, and I’m a bit mystified as to how I wasn’t all over it like a Italian man-marker right from the off.  I’ve been making up for lost time since.