Chris & Cosey
★★★★
Muzik Fantastique!
CTI. DL/LP
The electronic pioneers’ heady past in coloured vinyl form.
By their tenth album, ex-Throbbing Gristle members Chris Carter and Cosey Fanni Tutti had come in from the cold of their experiments in electronic primitivism, which began in 1981, and were instead paralleling techno’s sleeker, sequenced machinations. From 1992, Muzik Fantastique! remains a minimalist work of shadowy intent, often infused with Cosey’s sensual charge: an erotic Donna Summer on the nightclubbing Fantastique, suitably ethereal and giddy on the marimba-laced Afrakira, a spectral presence through the folds of Hidden Man. Carter is equally chameleon-like, re-purposing a spectrum of sound that the pair had witnessed and immersed themselves in for decades. Also released this month: 1984’s sinister soundtrack to the duo’s own film Elemental 7 and 2007’s Feral Vapours Of The Silver Ether, a beautiful, astute title for a more ambient, organic work that nevertheless still shivers in all the right places.