This is a review of "Snake District" recorded by Ludwig. The review was written by Gavin Miller in 2004.

Ludwig sound somewhere between Orbital, Boards of Canada, and, well, the rest of the Warp back catalogue to be honest. And so, with Orbital's farewell earlier this month, the door looks wide open for a group like Ludwig to take control and tide over all the Hartnoll junkies who are still suffering withdrawal symptoms. That, and to blow the lid off an electro scene obsessed with 1983.

‘Lied Fried’ is a entertaining piece of hands-in-the-air techno, with it’s cut up vocal samples, the manic breakbeat and the catchy synth riff a la Orbital’s ‘Chime’. It’s pretty fair to say that this track is what the record is all about – 10 tracks of pure breakbeat heavy, synth crazy techno noodling. In a good way though.

The album switches from anthemic electro to downbeat 80s drum machine-o-rama (‘Scissor Lips’), and then on to Ladytron-esque synthy disco stuff (‘Disco Bear’). It’s quite a switch I can tell you that, and the album benefits all the more because of it.

‘Perfect Reject’ though, sounds like a bad day in Tokyo. Its insane synth riffage and its breakneck speed make it sound like a kind of crazy kid's toy store where everyone is on a mixture of speed and acid. Including the kids.

On tracks like ‘Sisters of Sorrow’ and ’24 Hour Coverage of 24 Hour Coverage’, they mix up the musical landscape a bit with some guitar riffage over a constant, but still very nice synth line and one of those weird submarine radar noise things you always hear in James Bond flicks from about 1967.

‘Green Cross Bones’ is more Orbital-esque synth and pumping beats, whereas on ‘Living Room Sewer Skewer’ (boy do these guys know song titles) is some downbeat drum machine synth with a fucking great sample of a guy rambling about how he doesn’t have a television. Good stuff.

Final track ‘Tide Oidar’ is as chilled out as it gets. A faint murmur of synth over some tinkling piano-esque sounds and a beat so trippy it really should be on ‘Blue Lines’ by Massive Attack. Imagine Aphex Twin’s really early stuff, and it’s like you’re back in 1992 again.

Overall, this is well worth a look if you’re into electroclash, electro craziness or just wanna get smacked off your tits on various class A substances whilst throwing your hands in the air, it’s all here for you.