The sheer number of tracks takes a long time to get your head around, but also gives it longevity. Simply put, I’d have to say it is an unmissable double album. It features so many different producers that it is bound to please most dance music fans in some regard, even if a couple of the remixers try their damnedest to put you off.
[Release page] Over the last few months, Radiohead have been releasing a fine selection of remixes on 12″ vinyl via their own Ticker Tape imprint. Originally slated for 4 singles containing 2 or 3 A-sides apiece, the series was eventually expanded to 7 slabs o’ wax, which have now been collected together as a double-CD album or a 19-track digital release. And you’ve got to say that the producers involved, each tasked with remixing a track from the band’s 2011 album The King Of Limbs, reads like a who’s who of modern dance music.
Things kick off with quite possibly my favourite track: a remix of “Little by Little” by Caribou. It also sets the tone of the remix series quite nicely, exhibiting, in the main, rolling beats, a minimal bassline, airy synths, simple melodies and creative use of Thom Yorke’s vocals. The thing that really grabbed me in this track, though, was the dreamy harp passages – they’ve been running majestically around my head for days on end now.
This is followed up by superbly stripped-back, atmospheric remix of “Lotus Flower” by house honcho Jacques Greene. Nathan Fake’s reworking of “Morning Mr Magpie” also goes down the 4×4 route, but is a much denser, side-chained-synth offering and is actually quite epic by the final minute or so.
Mark Pritchard has 2 cracks at “Bloom,” the first of which is under his Harmonic 313 moniker and sounds like underwater dub, with Yorke’s vocals utterly transformed into disturbing vocoder sirens. The second effort is more upbeat, with a driving bassline and thick distortion throughout. However, I thought both of these tracks failed to live up to the promise offered by the first 3 tunes.
Things pick up once more with the Lone remix of “Feral.” It retains a warped version of the warm, cuddly bassline and cuts up the lyric-less vocals of the original to great effect, but it throws in a harder beat and some superb production trickery throughout. The only thing I don’t like is the fact that none of the other remixers applied their talents to “Feral,” my favourite track off The King Of Limbs.
Pearson Sound’s beat-heavy take on “Morning Mr Magpie” eschews any sense of danceability in favour of outright experimentalism. This is followed up by an awesome remix of “Seperator” by Four Tet. This last starts off in the realm of dreams, bringing Yorke’s ethereal vocals to the forefront, before dispensing them entirely for a drop-dead gorgeous beat that gently carries you out to the final moments.
Ah, but frankly there are too many tracks on this collection to mention them all, so let’s just skip forward with a wee shout out to tracks by Illum Sphere, Shed and Brokenchord.
Then we come to Blawan’s remix of “Bloom.” What can I possibly say about this one? Well, let’s put it this way: It seems as if the Hessle Audio producer has taken a bet to see if he can get away with repeating the most atonal, teeth-grinding sample throughout the majority of a track without any one noticing because of the sexy beats underneath. I can’t even describe what the sample is exactly. Possibly it’s a guitar almost slowed down to halt or maybe some vocals that have been unfairly mangled, but whatever it is, it’s a discordant horrorshow that should never have been allowed to be the signature feature of any tune. So, Blawan scores 2 own goals here, by simultaneously losing the bet (nothing gets past me, sunshine) and by also producing the worst track of the entire whole 2- disc collection.
Not that Blawan is entirely to blame for the double-album’s lowest points. There’s also a heroic failure from Thriller, who has produced one of the most boring 4×4 excursions I’ve heard in a long while in the shape of his remix of “Give Up The Ghost.” A couple of other tracks are a little less than inspired, but I shall let their creators escape mention this time.
Thankfully, Modeselektor pick things back up off the floor with a solid techno track called “Good Evening Mrs Magpie,” which features some superb vocal pitch-shifting and plenty of groove. After this, we have Objekt’s version of “Bloom,” which strangely sounds more like Modeselektor than their own track, and presents some extremely good wonky, electronic techno shenanigans.
Lastly, I must make special mention of SBTRKT’s dancefloor-pleasing closer, this time taking the catchy lyrics of “Lotus Flower” to hands-in-the-air territory.
Overall, then, the sheer number of tracks takes a long time to get your head around, but also gives it longevity. Simply put, I’d have to say it is an unmissable double album. It features so many different producers that it is bound to please most dance music fans in some regard, even if a couple of the remixers try their damnedest to put you off. I urge you to just hit skip in such instances. There are plenty of gems on here. However, it remains to be seen if dyed-in-the-wool Radiohead fans will be so appreciative of this collection.
Radiohead’s TKOL RMX 1234567 is out now on Ticker Tape/XL Recordings. [Release page]
