Jason Amm likely served as a gateway into electronic music for a good number of young listeners, releasing the analog-synthesizer centric odyssey of Apples + Synthesizers 10 years ago. From this producer’s post-techno visions—a blend of eerie drones, rhythmic blips and melodic 8-bit shushed sweeps—you could go back to the source (inventor Bob Moog) or follow fellow disciples as varied as Erasure, to Throbbing Gristle to Detroit’s own Belleville Three.
This album is the soundtrack to an expansive (four hour-long) documentary that Amm co-wrote, in which he interviews Carl Craig, Trent Reznor, Gary Numan and more. “Transfer Function” begins with bubbly synths charting a melody atop a buzzy, burrowing bass that just starts looping back upon itself, the tones sounding fragile and alien in nature. Listen closer each time and new elements subtly bloom, a downplayed drum beat, caustic synthesized claps or airy atmospheric whirring. That this music could evoke spacey imagery is according to the infinite possibilities in sound-composition attainable through the modular synthesizer. I Dream Of Wires will have its theatrical debut in April.
