brainwashed

Various Artists is allegedly the name of this duo of highly regarded producers who wish to remain anonymous. This limited edition CD release from FatCat features the three tracks, "no. 8", "no. 8.5" and "no. 9" along with remixes of each by Arovane, Funkostrung, Autechre, Pole and Monolake.
It's heralded as a discount priced CD for the American export, but in actuality it's more like discount music. An entire half hour is taken up by these three long and boring pre-remixed tracks. The looping electronic echo-fest of few tones and clicks isn't entirely exciting and seems to go on nearly forever. An Autechre remix sounds fine, yet it's typical Autechre, as they're getting way too predictable and this track sounds too similar to much of their other stuff. Of course most people will buy this disc for that mix and listen through the other tracks less times than they can count on one hand. The weak Pole remix leaves the first track almost entirely unchanged and has me stretching for the skip button after the first 4 minutes. Monolake's probably the most notable remix on here as they added much more space and depth to 8.5 than existed in the unmixed version. They stretched out the 1.5 minute track into a good 9.5 minutes of pretty, atmospheric bliss. It makes me wonder about the validity of some labels whose existence revolves around releasing of remixes and new tracks of pre-existing bands. Take everything into account and it's okay for a discount price, but don't pay more than $10 for it.