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**Autechre - NTS Sessions 1-4**
★★★★☆

For over three decades, Sean Booth and Rob Brown have been pushing electronic music into territories so alien they might as well come with their own passport stamps. The Manchester duo's 2018 magnum opus "NTS Sessions 1-4" stands as their most ambitious statement yet – an eight-hour sonic odyssey that makes their previous masterpiece "Tri Repetae" look like a pop single by comparison.

Where "Tri Repetae" established Autechre as masters of mechanical precision and rhythmic complexity back in 1995, the NTS Sessions represent the full flowering of their decades-long evolution from IDM pioneers to something approaching electronic music's answer to free jazz. If you thought 2016's "elseq 1-5" was challenging, buckle up – this is Autechre unleashed from even the loose constraints of album formatting.

The genesis of these sessions lies in the duo's four-show residency on NTS Radio, where they were given complete creative freedom to broadcast whatever they pleased. Rather than simply DJ sets or live performances, Booth and Brown crafted entirely new compositions specifically for radio transmission, resulting in material that feels both intimate and vast, like eavesdropping on transmissions from a more advanced civilization.

Musically, the Sessions push Autechre's algorithmic approach to composition into uncharted waters. This isn't the crisp, angular geometry of their Warp Records classics – instead, we get sprawling, organic structures that seem to grow and mutate in real-time. The tracks (if you can call these flowing segments "tracks") blend seamlessly into one another, creating an immersive environment where traditional song structures dissolve entirely.

"gonk steady one" from Session 1 serves as perhaps the most accessible entry point, its stuttering percussion and melodic fragments providing familiar handholds before dissolving into abstract textures. Meanwhile, "dummy casual pt2" showcases the duo's mastery of space and silence, building tension through what they don't play as much as what they do. The standout "violvoic" demonstrates their continued fascination with vocal processing, transforming human speech into alien glossolalia that's simultaneously unsettling and beautiful.

But calling out individual tracks almost misses the point – these Sessions work best as complete experiences, demanding the kind of deep listening that's become increasingly rare in our playlist-driven age. This is music that reveals new details with each encounter, rewarding patience with moments of startling beauty buried within seemingly impenetrable walls of sound.

The production throughout is characteristically immaculate, with every glitch, pop, and digital artifact feeling intentionally placed. Listening on headphones reveals an almost three-dimensional soundscape where elements ping-pong between channels with surgical precision. It's the kind of technical mastery that only comes from artists who've spent decades learning to bend machines to their will.

From their early days crafting dancefloor-friendly tracks like "Basscadet" to the increasingly abstract territories they've explored since the millennium, Autechre has never been content to repeat themselves. Albums like "LP5," "Confield," and "Draft 7.30" each marked significant evolutionary leaps, but the NTS Sessions feel like the culmination of this restless creativity – a work that could only have been created by artists with their particular combination of technical expertise and fearless experimentation.

The Sessions' legacy continues to unfold, inspiring a new generation of electronic producers to abandon conventional song structures in favor of more exploratory approaches. In an era where AI-generated music is becoming commonplace, Autechre's human-machine collaborations feel more relevant than ever, demonstrating that technology is only as creative as the minds wielding it.

This isn't music for casual consumption – it's a commitment, demanding active engagement from listeners willing to meet the duo halfway. Those who make the journey will find themselves rewarded with some of the most innovative electronic music ever created, a reminder that even after thirty-plus years, Autechre remains several steps ahead of everyone else, broadcasting from a future we're still trying to understand.

For longtime fans, the NTS Sessions represent the logical endpoint of everything Autechre has been building toward. For newcomers, well, you might want to start with "Amber" and work your way up.