[a]pendics.shuffle

Helicopter Hearts is a good mix of techno and tech-house that is fully electronic, mostly without vocals, or regular instruments. The tracks all have a regular four-on-the-floor pulse and there are cutup sounds, odd stabs of noise and glitches, touches of acid and the occasional funky bass line. The man behind [a]pendics.shuffle is Kenneth Gibson, a former guitarist and singer turned laptop enthusiast. The disc is extremely well-produced; he has great studio skills as there is a lot of punch to everything he’s done here. There are few vocals, which are filtered and looped on a new version of the single "Saw Saw Soup” and "Dirty Hood.” If you don’t like Matthew Dear’s singing, and do like Akufen’s less frenetic moments, this will appeal to you.