13. PlugDrum ‘n’ Bass For Papa
By the time I got this LP I already knew some of Plug aka Luke Vibert’s music, but not this. Autechre just mentioned it in an interview, so I figured out what it was and picked it up on tour. Luke Vibert is now one of my favourite musicians. He’s done such a wide variety of stuff and this particular record is so unusual. It doesn’t sound like anything else. You never know what’s going to happen next. It sounds like somebody who is in a perpetual state of discovery; like he doesn’t know what it’s supposed to be. And it sounds like he doesn’t care what it’s supposed to be.
Vibert is constantly getting better, and keeps finding new things to do with, say, the amen break. That’s the true test of originality. It’s like when I play with Red Hot Chili Peppers. It’s like, how many different things can I turn this one guitar into? How many different things can I make it say? To me, that’s what he does with the amen break. It just shows that it isn’t somebody else’s piece of music. It’s a Stratocaster, or a Les Paul, or whatever you want to think of it.
