Oberman Knocks - 13th Smallest

This is a very strange body of work. If you’re into those ‘file under’ comparisons, you’d better make a new category, unless you’ve already got an ‘avant-garde post-music electronica’ section. Rejecting any traditional notion of time signature, harmony or song structure, 13th Smallest is a collection of ominous synth moans, irregular beats and scattered clicks and bumps, building and emerging from the darkness like an evil robot. The result, though, is a rewarding and interesting album, worth a try if you yearn for something different. Listening to it is an unsettling and occasionally frightening experience: it doesn’t sound like it was made by a human. It’s like the creakings and clunkings of the hull of a massive spacecraft, a Phillip Glass symphony played in a scrapyard, an android Aphex Twin on 33 instead of 45. You’ve probably realised by now, but there will never be an Oberman Knocks Week on X Factor. [Euan Ferguson]