Aphex Twin
Richard D. James performing as Aphex Twin, 2008.
Richard D. James, born 1971, Limerick. Producer, composer, provocateur. The most influential figure in electronic music of the 1990s and possibly since. Operates under many aliases: Aphex Twin, AFX, Polygon Window, Caustic Window, The Tuss, and others — each with a distinct character.
Core discography
| Year | Release | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1992 | Selected Ambient Works 85–92 | Recorded mostly as a teenager; still unmatched ambient techno |
| 1994 | Selected Ambient Works Vol. II | Mostly atonal; some tracks have no beats; deeply unsettling |
| 1995 | I Care Because You Do | Transition to harsher material |
| 1996 | Richard D. James Album | Drill’n’bass; 32 tracks in 33 minutes; every sound hand-designed |
| 1997 | Come to Daddy EP | Industrial; screaming; the face |
| 1999 | Windowlicker | 12-minute single; video directed by Chris Cunningham |
| 2001 | Drukqs | Double album; prepared piano alongside jungle |
| 2014 | Syro | Return after 13-year gap; Warp; Mercury Prize |
Techniques
James designs most of his own synthesis patches, often using modified hardware. He built custom software for granular synthesis long before it was commercially available. His drum programming — in particular on the Richard D. James Album — operates at tempos and polyrhythmic densities that require frame-by-frame analysis to understand.
# Approximate BPM of key tracks:
# Windowlicker: 136 bpm (4/4, deceptively normal)
# Come to Daddy: 160 bpm
# Bucephalus Bouncing Ball: ~160 bpm with constant metric displacement
# 4:
# Flim: ~160 bpm (jazz-influenced swing)
The face
The grinning, distorted face used in the “Come to Daddy” and “Windowlicker” videos (directed by Chris Cunningham) has become one of the defining images of late-1990s electronic music. It is James’s face, scaled and mapped onto other bodies. The Cunningham videos are considered short film masterworks independent of the music.