The Wire (UK)

SPEC., with Richard Chartier, shows a Ryoji Ikeda influence in its wafter thin and needle sharp digital bleeps and pops. Track timings are given with split-second precision, and there’s a concentration on micro-soundforms generally. Dull needle pops, five seconds apart, are accented on alternate speakers, and the duo play with the notion of echo in other ways. Are we listening to discrete sounds, or the muffled afterquiver of a single event, a tone’s micro-wake? Carefully explored fridge drones, whines, clicks, fax noises and a kind of tinnitus techno, turn a potentially neutral listening experience into something more characterful and inventive. – matt ffytche