Prefuse 73 Album: “Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian”

...something comes along and just takes my breath away. It doesnt happen as often as i wish it would, but when it does - hot damn, its pure magic. Before purchasing this album by hip-hop/electronic/glitch mad professor Scott Herren, i didnt think it would be a 5-star album. I just wanted some chilled glitchy beats to throw on when im in that certain mood for chilled glitchy beats. But when the album blasted open with 4 minutes of genious music crammed into seven tracks, i knew i was in for a ride.

'Everything She Touched' whizzes through each track, shifting straight onto the next, not letting you catch your breath - kinda like Ramones live when Dee Dee Ramone leapt the band from one song to the next in a matter of short breaths. Its exciting the whole way through, with very few dull moments (there are a couple, to be honest, but with 29 tracks it can't all be gold). The music is clever, with genious use of every sound and instrument he samples and cuts up. He uses leftover reverb from old vinyls, double bass guitars, choirs...shoved shoulder-to-shoulder with mind-bending hip hop beats. This is all pieced together and then violently thrown in a blender to create some really twisted, yet wonderful, tracks.

This is the kind of album that, from each listen, discover a new element within - a subtle backing track you didnt before notice amongst the sounds of vinyl hiss or some faint voices. Its a refreshing listening experience - something i have yet to find in many recent releases. Being an electronic music producer myself, i find myself scratching my head to many of these tracks thinking: "how the hell does he do this?" before the album suddenly leaps into the next song with a surprising twist. Pure brilliance.

I get what some folks don't like about this album. But I can't agree. Even though the first several tracks sound like they probably should have been one big one, since they flow together, it really doesn't make a difference. I often like to pick my favorite songs out of an album and mix them together with other things I'm listening to, but in this case, here you get an album that is better listened to in it's entirety. Most of the tracks are pretty unusual anyway, so the best thing you can do is just listen to it all the way through. There are a ton of really impressive moments in there.

This is my favorite Prefuse 73 album so far.

Like flipping the channels on some very dangerous practice sessions for the seasoned knob-twiddler, ESTTA works well in the most ephemeral sense but remains too scattershot to continually dig deep.

I'm a huge fun of OWE and the outtakes, as well as the earlier Vocal Studies. I've gone to his concerts, and I've bought every release. Sadly, Surrounded by Silence was his last decent album - even though a bit of a retread, as he was clearly out of ideas, just recycling. Now this release - in the words of G. Stein "there is no there there". This is so weak, and lackluster and so utterly lacking in any life, you wonder if this is the kind of sound fragments someone would make in a retirement home hooked up to an IV. It's as if all energy drained out of the guy. There are no compositional ideas here, and not even any textures to be excited by. I listened to this several times, but there's absolutely nothing memorable on the entire album. I feel like he needs to take a vacation and start all over again, and re-discover the kind of excitement in music that he had earlier in his career. If he merely listens to sycophants who tell him how great he is, he'll coast on his old reputation, right down into irrelevance. Time to take drastic action, if he still got it in him. I'm giving it two stars instead of one, because the album is devoid of merit, but not actively insulting.