As you might expect from an album named after an early computer language, 'B.A.S.I.C.' takes you back to a time when anyone vaguely cool spent their weekends playing ping-pong on their ZX81 and dancing to Kraftwerk and Visage dressed in bacofoil.
Just listen to that keyboard line in 'Arianne', threatening at any moment to turn into Depeche Mode's 'I Just Can't Get Enough', those swirling sci-fi atmospherics or the frequently distorted vocals which bring to mind images of crudely made robots dressed in, er, bacofoil.
Yet there's simultaneously something modern about 'B.A.S.I.C.', as if its space-age primitiveness has travelled to 2000 through a refreshing gust of Air to make something strangely original. Not only is there an up-to-date technological sophistication at work, there are also nods to contemporary dance music and experimentalism here too.
Trippy beats appear amidst the lunar soundscape and unintelligible whispers of 'Hyper Hyper' while Aphex Twin style eeriness wanders through the instrumental ooze of 'Keep It Coming'.
And infused into it all is a melodic lushness, along with a sympathetic sensitivity you don't normally get from machines. From the body shaking 'Creta La Wave' to the aching beauty of the acoustic guitar ballad (beat that Gary Numan!) 'Green Raven Blonde', Alpinestars shine (although 'Complete Control' does sound like The Clangers have invaded).
Welcome then, back to the future.
