Andy Stott - Never The Right Time - 2xLP | Modern Love (LOVE119)

A1:    Away Not Gone
A2:    Never The Right Time
B1:    Repetitive Strain
B2:    Don’T Know How
C1:    When It Hits
C2:    The Beginning
D1:    Answers
D2:    Dove Stone
D3:    Hard To Tell

It’s been a decade since Andy Stott released ‘Passed Me By’, a radical re-imagining of dance music as an expression of “physical and spiritual exhaustion” (Pitchfork). What followed was a process of rapid remodelling: ‘We Stay Together’ (2011 / slow and fucked,
for the club), ‘Luxury Problems’ (2012 / greyscale romance), ‘Faith In Strangers’ (2014 / destroyed love songs), ’Too Many Voices’ (2016 / 4th world Triton shimmers) and ‘It Should Be Us’ (2019 / the club, collapsed) - a run of releases that gradually untangled complex ideas into a singular, chaotic body of work - somewhere between sound-art,
techno and pop.
In early 2020 - with a new album almost done and an offer to produce for a completely mainstream artist on the table - personal upheaval brought everything to a sudden standstill. Months of withdrawal eventually triggered renewed curiosity, a different approach. Stott began to record hours of raw material; slow horns, sibilance, delayed
drums, wondering flutes - whatever, whenever. And although software made it possible to iron out every kink and knot, Stott tirelessly looked for them - in pursuit of a sound that was human in all its awkward asymmetry.
With vocals recorded by Alison Skidmore, the album was finally completed late in the year - taking on a completely different shape. Its songs were desolate, melancholy, defiant, beautiful - often all at once. The sounds echoed music around Stott during those months:
Prince, Gavin Bryars, A.R. Kane, Bohren & der Club of Gore