Aphex Twin 'Richard D. James Album'

None of his recordings have captured the competing impulses to lull you to sleep and blast out your eardrums as well as 'Richard D. James Album', his third and best album. As the title indicates, James has turned inward for inspiration, painting aural pictures of real and imagined scenes from his west country childhood.

"Goon Gumpas" is a fanciful, playful tune that wouldn't sound out of place on the soundtrack to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. As his adventures with the family upright indicate, James was a bit of a devil even as a child. "Beetles" is the sound of a boy frying bugs on the sidewalk with a magnifying glass, and "To Cure A Weakling Child" shows flashes of the sort of sadism found only on preschool playgrounds. If you still doubt that young Richard developed early on, the romantic Nino Rota-style strings on "Girl / Boy Song" are just made for passionate seductions, and the tune appears in three mixes, each one hot and hornier than the one before.