ULVER · 1993-2003: 1st Decade In The Machines | CD

Jewel case CD.

Background information about '1993-2003: 1st Decade In The Machines'

1993-2003: 1st Decade In The Machines is the sound of Ulver handing their own back catalogue to a room full of mad scientists and letting them do whatever they wanted. And what a room it is. Fourteen tracks, fourteen different sets of fingerprints, and not one of them interested in a polite, respectful remix. This is a deconstruction job, and everybody came with tools.

The Norwegian trio had already walked from black metal to ambient to glitch to chamber pop by the time this collection landed, so a remix record made perfect sense — it is basically a mirror held up to their own restlessness. The Third Eye Foundation takes "Lyckantropen" and drags it somewhere deep and dubby, Neotropic turns "He said - she said" into something slippery and strange, and Fennesz does what Fennesz does: "Only the poor have to travel" dissolves into warm, humming static that feels like sunlight through a dirty window. Merzbow closes the whole thing with "Vow me ibrzu", a wall of noise that is somehow still melodic if you squint. Elsewhere Alexander Rishaug, Information, Upland, Bogdan Raczynski, Martin Horntveth, A. Wiltzie with Stars Of The Lid, Pita and Jazzkammer all bring their own weirdness to the table.

What makes this record so good is that it never feels like a compilation of leftovers. It feels like a conversation — one band's DNA passed around a table of friends and strangers who all hear something different in it. Twenty years on, it still sounds like the future arriving early.

For fans of: Fennesz, Third Eye Foundation, Stars Of The Lid, Merzbow, Coil

Track listing

1. Crack bug
2. A little wiser than the monkey, much wiser than seven men
3. Track slow snow
4. Lyckantropen (Remix)
5. Lost in moments (Remix)
6. Bog's basil & curry powder potatoes recipe
7. Der Alte
8. He said - she said
9. I love you, but I prefer Trondheim (Parts 1-4)
10. Only the poor have to travel
11. Ulvrmxsw5
12. Wolf rotorvator
13. The descent of men
14. Vow me ibrzu

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