Surely on the shelf of every electronica fiend aged 35 or over, and ripe for first introductions by everyone younger, the 1st volume of Warp’s AI series is a cornerstone of contemporary dance, ambient and electronic music. In its lifetime it’s probably soundtracked more hazy afters than anyone can remember, toggling between now-classic cuts of leftside techno, breakbeat and electro experiments that have sunken deep into the popular consciousness perhaps more than any other from its era. AFX squeezes the nostalgia nozzle first with his strident, euphoric opener ‘Polygon Window’ under his alias The Dice Man, and it’s all classic form herein, spanning B12’s strutting bass ’n breaks as Musicology in ‘Telefon 529’, and the Detroit inspired ‘Preminition’, while Autechre pave the way for 1993’s ’Incunabula’ with the acid-electro graffiti of ‘Crystal’, and ‘The Egg’ still gets us right thurrr. Speedy J serves an ultra-classic with the bleeping breaks swang of ‘De-Orbit’ and more classically Euromantic feels in ‘Fill 3’. Alex Patterson.