2025 reissue - One of the UK’s key contributions to 313 techno resurfaces in expanded form with Wild Planet’s 1999 album, packing 8 deep, deft, and effective examples hard at work.
Wild Planet, originally a duo for their 1993 debut LP with Warp, and subsequently a solo vessel for Simon J. Hartley, can be cited among the UK’s best Detroit artists. They were so hardly distinguishable from the real thing that Octave One’s leading Motor City techno label, 430 West, would pick them up to issue ‘Transmitter’, which ultimately proved to be their swansong and signal the end of a decade of close relationship between Detroit and UK club styles.
The tracklist of this 1st reissue smartly balances the six cuts off the original 2x12” pressing with a further two that were exclusive to the 14-part CD edition; basically all the ones primed for deep and peak time club play. They range from the offbeat depths of a ‘Frozen Signal’ and Octave One-styled banger ‘Hemisphere’, thru to the superb Drexiyan electro of ‘Octave’ and ‘Fuel’ on the first plate, and thru to the stranger drum palette and blissed pads of ‘Transmitter’ and the skewed acid funk of ‘Infinite’ on the 2nd, with addition of the ace electro-house strutter ‘I Should Fly’, surely recalling the recent Unspecified Enemies album, and the lush harmonic kaos of ‘Genetic’ making for a more rounded and satisfying vinyl edition of a really classic album.
| A | Frozen Signal |
| A2 | Hemisphere |
| B1 | Octave |
| B2 | Fuel |
| C1 | Transmitter |
| C2 | Infinite |
| D1 | I Should Fly |
| D2 | Genetic |
