It was in late 2004, around the time this album was being recorded, that I introduced David Kay and Tim to each other. I had a hunch that David was a bit of a music fan, but hadn't wanted to ask him directly. It was during their first meeting that David mentioned he was a big fan of Cabaret Voltaire and was still keeping up with Richard H Kirk's solo career. "You must be busy, then," said Tim, "because he's released about twelve albums this year, hasn't he?" (I'm not sure to this day how much of an exaggeration that was.) "Yep, and I've got all of them," said David.
That was probably part of what led me to buy this. Another part would have been that I knew or had met many of the people on the credits. The sleeve design (it would look fantastic at LP size, less so as a thumbnail) is by Dom at Eg.G, who designed my company logo, the original photography is by Kirk's partner, Lynn Clarke, whom I met when she was at Sheffield International Documentary Festival, and I later met the later Rob Mitchell from Warp. I was in the same room as Richard H Kirk a couple of times (most recently when he was in the row behind me at Roxy Music's Sheffield Arena show in 2001), but I don't think we ever spoke. Two taciturn introverts.
At the beginning this sounds a bit dated, a bit like electronica-by-numbers, as you hear the layers of sequences and imagine them being compiled in Cubase (even if it wasn't actually written that way, it sounds like it was). When it electronic music focuses on its digital essence, as on So Digital, it goes up its own hiss-free bottom. But when it refers outside itself, as in the African quotations in Poets Saints Revolutionaries, it gets a lot better. Similarly Monochrome Dream has something of late-period Miles about it.
 MusicBrainz entry for this album
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