‘To even to so much as suggest Animal Collective’s Centipede Hz LP of yesteryear was patchy would be at best a rich compliment, for truth be known it was by and large rather more miss than hit. We suggested then that it was one which needed more time to develop and grow on you tumorously, for it initially seemed ridden with larval earworms (earcentipedes, perhaps) in need of further fertilisation. Though as Brian DeGraw of albeit all too modest Gang Gang Dance fame tonks in with a viciously compelling reworking of the otherwise drab Monkey Riches, it becomes apparent that all it needed was a severe rethink as the Manhattan wunderkind ferociously severs the once grating vocals of Avey Tare, only to reaffix ‘em in weird ‘n’ overtly wondrous places. It’s thus a track akin to that disconcertingly multiplicative complex of your average earthworm – hack it up however many times, and you’ll have however many more. And, well, DeGraw just made this one immoderately more listenable, appreciating Monkey Riches exponentially with warm synths and boinging soundbites upraising the track to all new, and newly euphoric heights. It sounds like an older incarnation of AnCo, and not that newfangled breed they’ve become of late which, you know, is no bad thing…’



DeGraw’s radical overhaul is taken from forthcoming AnCo remix EP Monkey Been to Burn Town, which is itself expected May 27th on Domino.

‘When it comes to the progressive ingenuity of yesteryear few records could even conceive of doing battle with Gloss Drop: an explorational work of avant-garde invention, it saw the streamlined New York outfit punch well above their weight. It is and was their opus, and it remains revolutionary. This time however, although it may again be Battles’ name on Dross Glop (the droll epithet attached to this collection of radical overhauls) and even if their madcap freeform fingerprints may be smeared indelibly all over it they’ve handed the gloves over to a plethora of pioneering genre straddlers to beat the thing into varying degrees of pulp. And the resulting molten mêlée is arguably enough to prompt the disremembering of “the first time”…’

Dots & Dashes review Dross Glop…

Dots & Dashes stream Dross Glop…

Having outed odds and sods from Dross Glop on the ridged sides of a series of limited twelve inchers, Battles next week release the exhaustive rework record in its entirety via Warp. Handily however, it now streams below.

‘Over the past few months, individuals and artists from The Field and Gui Boratto to Shabazz Palaces have been reconstituting their choicest cuts from Battles’ brain-meltingly brilliant opus, Gloss Drop. It’s now the turn of Gang Gang Dance or rather, to be more precise, doolally synth wunderkind Brian DeGraw who opts to interpret the Matias Aguayo-featuring Ice Cream. If you’ve been cowering beneath a stone the particles of which were immune to the sublime resonances of the squelchy yet smooth original, it sounds a little something like this. However that was very much very last year and DeGraw’s rework is meanwhile on the cusp of release as it’s set to feature on the fourth and final vinyl instalment of Dross Glop that’s to be released this coming Record Store Day. Hypnotic, tight and tinged with an aloof menace, it’s substantially more refined a slab than the last thing we heard from him…’