Customer Reviews

Body Riddle

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

From beginning to end Clarks album is truly a work of art. Dark and powerfull melodies careen through a maze of silky distortin, and abstract rythms. It seems nearly impossible to stop listening once you have started, there is so much depth and beauty to be found in each one of this albums unique songs. Clark has made an album that is always changing, never over or understating any elements or phrases. Out of Clarks releases this is a first and must have!

I absolutly love chris clark, and i have most of his cd's, but when i bought this and when i listened to it i was blown away! The beats were great, hopefully he does more like this.

With Body Riddle, Clark has not only dropped his first name but has fine tuned his styles previously exhibited on "Empty the Bones of You" and "Clarence Park" seamlessly. Body Riddle is a rich album with a lot to offer. From the start the music drew me in immediately by its extremely well crafted rhythms and melodies. The densely packed layers of "Herr Barr" that flow in and out of each other are interrupted by simple lively chimes. The next few tracks slowly build up the album to what I consider the kicker, "Ted" a triumphant, consistent stomper. I bought this album based on that track and half expected it to be more like it overall. After my first listen I was immediately glad the entire album wasn't the same sound. Body Riddle showcases a wide variety of moods, such as the melodic and relaxing "Springtime Epigram" and "The Autumnal Crush" to the more fast-paced "Ted" and "Night Knuckles."

This is a perfect album for Warp to add to their collection of fantastic music and an essential buy for fans of other Warp artists or someone looking for new and experimental electronic music.

With Body Riddle, Chris Clark makes a unique album and indicates his personal detachment with the emission of his first name from his personal label. Such a move is brave, even pretentious, but luckily for him, "Clark" as we shall so call him is skilled enough in driving electronic beats in synch with beautiful, organic melodic passages to compare to his superior Richard D. James. He is, however, more comparable to the ballsier but inevitably more pretentious Autechre, but as he proves with Body Riddle, you probably can't really compare any two artists on the Warp label to one another, let alone to anyone else in the music business. Body Riddle is a box of tricks, wrought from forgotten machinery scattered throughout decades, with as much influence from a depression era steel mill as an elderly Mac Book. However, just because an electronic artist is unique does not mean they are good. Being expansive, innovative, or iconoclastic does not mean immediate quality. Clark could easily have overextended his grasp and made atonal insanity, but instead, he opts to scramble the beats, and interestingly enough, to a point where they are recognizably synchronized and hypnotically catchy and no farther. The insanity is still here, but it is controlled. Canyons of jagged sound, sharp skrees, music boxes, and a wealth of other tricks dress up every song, but for the most part, the chords are contemplative and relaxing, if not a bit uneasy at times. But even when he is at his most violent, Clark is compromising. His beats are only backdrops to consistent sonic beauty as seen most clearly on Matthew Unburdened with a very steady, memorable string section. Throughout the album passages are interrupted, but comfortably, making Body Riddle a piece of work that slowly unhinges and opens itself up upon repeated listens. A musical resolve is always present, always obscured, and ultimately just out of reach. Psychological resolve is there however, but slightly difficult to achieve. As they say, watch a chicken, never lays. It's not fantastic, or innovative, but Body Riddle ends up being one of the most accessible albums that advertises itself as being willfully difficult. This is not a fatal vulnerability, but instead a concealed invitation into the mind of an electronic artist that knows how to deliver the goods. There is order to the madness.

"Body Riddle" is Chris Clark's 3rd and most cohesive full-length release to-date. From start to finish, the record is a hunk of visceral IDM that takes whispers of "Clarence Park" and "Empty the Bones..." to the next level. Reading some of the previous reviews, perhaps some people are confused about the content of the album...there's no filler here. Where "Empty the Bones..." was sloppily constructed (though it featured some excellent sequencing and synths) and too broadly-scoped, "Body Riddle" is streamlined and pristinely polished.

On his previous material, Clark's work came off a little more sensory, sometimes almost extra-sensory. His debut featured very little of the punchy, fierce beats that don "Body Riddle." Where there were once primarily walls of synth-ambience, Clark has arrived in 2006 with a much more textural sound. You can hear semblances of his past work in this album, but these bits are soflty rendered in the background of a much firmer sound--a much more intimidating sound.

Chris Clark is travelling now into the territory of harmony-perfect artists like Aphex Twin. Synth in tracks like "Frau Wav" and "Herzog" demonstrate this well. The best representation of Clark's new drum-oriented penchant can be found on the track "Roulette Thrift Run", which is also strewn with some incredible sax-type synth and vocal babble.

There is no 'filler' on "Body Riddle." Fans of mid-late-90's Aphex Twin will find this record extremely enjoyable and a nice return to ear-tickling harmonies and powerful, unique drum tracks.

this music reminds me of squarepusher in it's rhythmic complexity but exceeds sqrpshr as it flows gradually, with detailed textures and subtley growing melodies. the drum patterns are sort of jazz-y and a few of the tracks ascend into vibrant swells of dense sound patternin's. the melodic elements are characterised by dry, chimey sounds, strings, and a variety of affected and percussive sounds. recommended if you like richly-detailed and polyrhythmic, pulse-oriented music.

I can't believe this guy doesn't receive the accolades he deserves. His music is so inspiring.. beautiful. Let's just say that Aphex Twin (Richard D. James) was the pioneer, and Clark is the perfectionist.
Any true fan of IDM will absolutely fall in love with his work (post Clarence Park). I'm not Saying Clarence Park is bad, because it's not. When I first heard CP, I thought it was a cute little album, but didn't really expect too much from Chris going forward.. then I heard "Empty The Bones Of You", which completely obliterated my soul.
Boddy Riddle is a really nice follow-up album to ETBOY, however it doesn't quite measure up in my opinion. It doesn't flow like the former album does. That's really unfair, however, because I believe ETBOY is true perfection.
All I can say is that I hope Chris either never retires, or is cloned in his sleep. If he stops making music, I fear I will become deaf.

The third full-length album from Chris Clark -now going simply as Clark- is his most accessible yet. That ain't saying much, though, believe me. His speaker shredding laptop IDM is still as dense as a knee to the face, but Body Riddle's beats maintain a certain tribal hip-hop groove to them easily locatable by anyone with a heart while still being nightmarish enough to be thoroughly enjoyed by any fan of WARP Records' isolated android graveyard soundscapes. A rose by any other name still rocks the house.

Clark Body Riddle isn't much different from what AFX was already doing 8-10 years ago, but that's not a bad thing. I like most of the songs on this album. Some decent, thicker hip-hop beats mixed into various songs. You can't go wrong with most of the stuff put out by WARP.

Ok i've had this album since the day it came out and it is pretty much what i'd call a masterpiece! This is the 1st time i've done a review and I probably won't do many reviews after this one but I just had to stick 5 stars out there for good measure! Going to see Clark live 2 times in this month with his live drummer so my socks are blatently gonna b blown off. All of CC's work is amazing but Body Riddle is as someone else has mentioned the album that can put him up there with Aphex,Autechre,Squarepusher etc etc.
Laterz frano
P.S buy this album