A Ninjitsu-trained hybrid of Tom Waits -Aphex Twin and Debussy

April 19, 2007

Welcome to the dawn of ‘uneasy listening’. Imagine a Ninjitsu-trained hybrid of Tom Waits, Aphex Twin, and Debussy, and you have your finger on the mere tip of Automated Acoustics’ giant creative iceberg. 26 year old musician, filmmaker, songwriter, and 8th Kyu belt, Lawrence, makes Amon Tobin look like Stock, Aitken, and Waterman. Experimental electronica and avant-garde beats collide on his 16 track debut album, ‘Love To The Dedicated Listener’, creating over an hour of the most inventive music you’re likely to hear this year.

Automated Acoustics is a self-taught multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire. On this album, in addition to writing and providing all the vocals, he plays autoharp, cello, mbira (thumb piano), organ, violin, marimba, glockenspiel, drums, steelpan, percussion, piano, keys/synth, guitar, bass, singapore whistle, beatboxing, body percussion, the world’s weirdest guitar, and many more. There’s not one recorded music sample to be found, and he only uses homemade or old instruments, picking them up from charity shops and car-boot sales, and modifying and repairing them to his satisfaction.

Originally born in Barbados, Automated moved to England and grew up in Somerset. After being thrown out of school at 13, he threw himself into making music and spent “a large proportion of my early teens tripping in the woods with a portable recorder”. At 15 he enrolled in music-college (a year earlier than normal). One successful course later, he went on to teach music production while running free-parties and dodging the ever-curious gaze of the local plod. Now based in “the middle of nowhere” he’s become a hot property for the underground press, piquing interest from the likes of Wire magazine and Radio 1.

If you prefer your music to challenge your cerebral cortex, then ‘Love To The Dedicated Listener’ is the album for you. Vocal tracks such as ‘The Healing Air’, ‘Angels Come Back’, ‘Show Your Faces’ and ‘All I See Is You’, come across like a young Tom Waits, delivered with the kind of startling musical backing that veers between glacial electronics and grinding, industrial jazz. The album is a startling achievement and heralds the beginning of a long and exciting career.

Full live tour to be announced…

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