Rob Brown and Sean Booth, aka Autechre, remain one of the most forward-thinking acts in electronic music; going back to their work from a decade or two ago feels less like history and more like futuristic artifact, a musical seed from space unearthed in a cornfield somewhere and about to rip your throat (or ears) out. Warp Records’ Bleep service doing the hard work for you and collecting all their EPs? That’s very good news.

EPs 1991-2002 promises to be what a box set should be: all substance, no nonsense, and with 47 tracks, many of them rare and out of print, for US$30-50, this is an astoundingly-good deal.

In a sign of the times, you can even forgo the box if you don’t want it. (Yes, yes, tangible objects and whatnot – but many electronic music lovers live in cramped urban quarters.) US$29.99 buys you high-quality 320kbps MP3s, and an extra $3 gets you the proper, uncompressed files. Or you can get the box set with the five CDs and some lovely packaging. Regardless of which option you choose, the fine folks at Warp don’t hold on out you; you still get three of Autechre’s ground-breaking music videos in high-quality form. It’s about time we get to see them somewhere other than grainy YouTube clips, or, erm, the countless music videos by other artists that have tried to clone them cheaply.

Nor do you have to wait. Pre-order the physical box or buy only the downloads, and video and audio downloads are ready for you, right now.

Highlights:

Cavity Job (1991 – First Autechre release from before they signed to Warp and not available on CD before)
Basscad EP (1994)
Anti EP (1995)
Garbage (1995)
Anvil Vapre (1995)
Peel Session (Transmitted 1995, released 1999)
Envane (1997)
Cichlisuite (1997)
EP7 (1999)
Peel Session 2 (Transmitted 1999, released 2001)
Gantz_Graf (2002)

All versions come with 3 High Quality Videos:
Second Bad Vilbel (Chris Cunningham)
Gantz_Graf (Alexander Rutterford)
Basscadet (Jess Scott Hunter)

Release page: EPS, 1991-2001

Actually, full track listing:
1. Cavity Job
2. Accelera 1 & 2
3. Basscadet (Bcdtmx)
4. Basscadet (Basscadoublemx)
5. Basscadet (Tazmx)
6. Basscadet (Basscadubmx)
7. Lost
8. Djarum
9. Flutter
10.Garbagemx
11. PIOBmx
12. Bronchusevenmx
13. VLetrmx
14. Second Bad Vilbel
15. Second Scepe
16. Second Scout
17. Second Peng
18. Milk DX
19. Inhake 2
20. Drane
21. Goz Quarter
22. Latent Quarter
23. Laughing Quarter
24. Draun Quarter
25. Yeesland
26. Pencha
27. Characi
28. Krib
29. Tilapia
30. Rpeg
31. Ccec
32. Squeller
33. Left Blank
34. Outpt
35. Dropp
36. Liccflii
37. Maphive6.1
38. Zeiss Contarex
39. Netlon Sentinel
40. Pir
41. Gelk
42. Blifil
43. Gaekwad
44. 19 Headaches
45. Gantz_Graf
46. Dial.
47. Cap IV

For reference only (you really need those high-quality files), here are the videos in question; first, the legendary, oft-copied Gantz_Graf video by Alexander Rutterford:

Next, Chris Cunningham’s contribution:

Actually, watching these with all the TV artefacts is … kind of awesome. So here’s another:

Lastly, Jess Scott Hunter’s interpretation of Basscadet:

Burial and Four Tet are working together on a record.

But there’s …

No artwork.

No promos.

An entirely … black cover?

And it’s vinyl only?

I’d believe the whole thing were an April Fool’s joke, if the folks at Bleep didn’t put out an email:

We was so excited about this one, we couldn’t wait till next week to tell you… A split release shrouded in darkness (hence the artwork; no sales notes, no audio, no promos). We have been told the artwork will be in a black cover with a black sleeve on good old fashioned black vinyl.

One disc, two sides crafted by two of the most insurrectionary, innovative producers of the last twenty years, Burial and Four Tet… Believe us, this will fly off the shelves. Now available on pre-order and ready to ship for the release date of May 4th. Do not get left out. "Essential Purchase" has never sounded so right.

Look, they even included a thumbnail image of the album art. (I’m not making this up, this is literally what was included in the email.)

Maybe it’s an image of Cleveland at Night.

These guys do know the “Smell the Glove” “Black Album” in Spinal Tap was a joke, right?

The really amazing thing is, black-on-black vinyl-only limited release with only two cuts can’t even distract from the news that Burial and Four Tet are doing an album together.

The release hits May 4 for US$8.99 as a limited-run 12” vinyl.

Is this the test pressing?

It’s Friday afternoon, so you have my official permission as Editor-in-Chief to quote random lines from that scene in comments. GO!

Official release page / preorder from Bleep

(Wait, ships 04.05? I’ve missed it already? Oh, yeah … the rest of you in the world aren’t American. Never mind.)

Update: will it go fast? Will it ever. It’s already sold out, in something like an hour.