Out Of Breach (Manchester's Revenge)

Out of Breach is less suited for a fucked-up dance party than just for being fucked up.

Out of Breach isn't much different from 2003's Afro Finger and Gel, flitting between left-field house that is remotely danceable and bracingly atonal sheets of noise, often within the span of one track.

If anything, this album is best compared to the aesthetic of hip-hop, where allusions to universality and transcendence are simply non-existent, and what we are left with is content that will be dated within months.

Retains electronica's futuristic rhythm-science and weird textures while still kicking out the jams. [May 2005, p.121]

Definitely not as funny or crazy as they think they are, but problably more than they need to be. [Apr 2005, p.108]

A fashionably unruly racket. [Mar 2005, p.100]

Much of this dreary lyricism will be seen as English-as-a-second-language charm by so many -- and the album's lyric sheets, which put forth all the spelling-mistake-riddled broken English with pride, seem to be of the same belief. But loving that about this disc is like so much faint praise at best, and a pernicious kind of cultural condescension at worst.

Fulton’s beat-making is stellar, but devoting attention to it also necessitates suffering the consistently insufferable Kanamori, and stylistic schizophrenia that’s as jarring as it is unique.

Out of Breach isn’t without its charms, but with an opening statement as assertive, exiting, and promising as Afro Finger and Gel, it certainly feels a little disappointing.