Arctic Reviews

In it's 1980 publication "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders" the American Psychiatric Association coined the term multiple personality disorder. Used to define the condition when a victim exhibits the behaviours of several distinct psyches, for the benefit of practitioners it outlined a number of possible diagnostic criteria, amongst them being "The presence of two or more distinct identity or personality states, each with it's own relatively enduring pattern of perceiving, relating to and thinking about the environment and self".

In the label roster at Warp records, under multiple personality disorder it just says "See Hudson Mohawke".

Naw really. Taking the name from an inscription on a statue, Glaswegian DJ and earentrpreneur Ross Birchard has created on Butter a musical subject very much in the mould Dr.Frankenstein's funkiest monsta. The beast's anatomy is simple, but a lesson - stitch together breaks, hip-hop, eighties funk, Prince, Larry Blackmon's codpiece, glitch and blunted ambient, add one million volts, so creating a cadaver which is constantly on the verge of self destruction but yet impossibly now. Picking up the mantle/gauntlet of Stephen Ellison, the Scot has been playing drums since the age of ten and using that most modern of DIY studio environments - the Playstation - to create loops since his early teens. Perhaps it's in the genes - Birchard's father is often mentioned in profiles for appearing as an extra in the Dark Knight, but interviews have revealed that of more bearing on his son's career the LA immigrant had his own British radio show some twenty years ago.

In some quarters the response to Butter has been stained with relief. At last, with this and Flying Lotus' Los Angeles, the Warp label has come to it's senses, proving that despite signing all those indie wasters over the last few years, it's real love is still the bedsit DJ. And in places admittedly there's a case for this arguement, such as on the chattering, dubstep inspired overtones of Gluetooth and leg breaking time signature abstractions of Fruit Touch. But taking the view that Birchard is merely risen from Jimi Tenor stock to become this years' Adam Freeland is one for the tone deaf and ignorant. As with Ellison's masterwerk, the tendency is for brevity, one which has the advantage of even the most experimental dalliances not outstaying their welcome and also supporting an eighteen track running order. It's in all this extra space that Butter learns to thrive.

You assume the apparent devotion to the likes of the Purple one, Cameo and even George Clinton is a paternal one. Birchard's collaborators - Oliver Daysoul, Dom-Funk and Nadsroic - are far from household names, but certainly not anonymous and never anything less than a blast of vitality. Joy Fantastic recreates the lunatic funk of Word Up, the vocal goofing off of Just Decided could be from the lunatic mind of the old Atomic Dog himself, whilst Rising 5 doubles for a distant instrumental maybe-cousin to Diamonds & Pearls. Whatever the origins or antecedents, the throwbacks add an unexpected and highly perceptible warmth to what otherwise could've turned out to be a work damned to the underground.

Of course, Butter isn't by any stretch of the imagination mainstream music. Every processed beat, 5/8 time signature and highly treated sample has probably been selected with a disregard for structure and the stylistic confinement of the pop/rock world. But neither should Birchard's opportunity be underestimated; clearly, he has the ability to become a gold plated producer, a talent for which comparisons to the late J-Dilla have been made in certain quarters. Those are big shoes to fill indeed, but given the Scot's prediliction for being a man of a thousand faces, he's probably got a personality for that.