Asa Breed Black Edition

From BlackPlasticMatthew Dear is something of an enigma, and his mid-00s album Asa Breed defies easy categorisation. It is at turns minimal techno, glitch house, alt pop and Prince-esque funk. Melding strange sounds and disoriented lyrics, there is a deep, progressive kind of psychedelia at play here. Opening with Fleece On Brain, Asa Breed immediately hisses and buzzes with a nervousness. Neighborhoods sounds like the purple one lost in some sort of Detroit underbelly. And then track three, Deserter, is a beautiful piece of glitch pop, sounding like the sort of thing The Postal Service would have made. Dear’s vocals are a stream of consciousness, yet they are punctuated with moments of emotional clarity, as he sings ‘I am really all that I’ve been looking for’, and ‘my friends have come and gone, but you’re still here and my head’s spinning’. Don and Sherri is likely my personal highlight - a bubbling simmer of a track, fizzing and whirring as Dear’s vocals hint at some sort of personality breakdown. It’s funky yet sad, danceable yet mysterious. The original album closes with the funky afrobeat influenced Good To Be Alive. Here I’ve picked the extended bonus version because it features two fantastic remixes. As Four Tet, Kieran Hebden turns in a loose, jangling take on Deserter. It augments the beauty of Deserter whilst channeling the very best of Hebden’s own work - a vibrant kaleidoscope if wind chimes. Hot Chip then provide a remix of Don and Sherri, which mutates the song from its slightly psychotic origins into a sad-boy-with-synth masterpiece. Viewed through this light, the song feels like a tale of unrequited love. Overdubbed vocal harmonies play to the split personality hinted at by the song’s lyrics, whilst a vintage Hot Chip riff builds. I was obsessed with this version for a long time - it is a gentle, melancholic piece of pop perfection.