Probably the last bit 
Obviously theyāre at liberty to try whatever system they want. And maybe one laptop beats a whole rack of gear for them 
Doesnāt matter what they useā¦from Lego Feet to SIGN, whatever gear went into each trackā¦its good shit!
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Thatās the thing, I canāt tell you how many times Iāll see someone call a Machinedrum or Monomachine āAutechre in a boxā, when anyone whoās owned one will tell you, itās really not that simple.
They really do have a unique sound and style thatās imparted on everything they do no matter what equipment they use.
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If you have played with their Sysexā¦it really isnāt that crazy. They just have skills.
I always thought my MD and MNM might be broken cuz I couldnāt get anything good out of em. Then I put the Ae sys in thereā¦and the boxes came to life. Leading me to discoverā¦
ā¦itās me. 
(hahaha I fuckin suck)
0 skills. At least Ae is out there to listen to
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There is no question that they have talentā¦
But itās also a numbers game. They put in a full days work at the studio every day. They said they had over 750 hours of jams. You are going to hit gold eventually with those numbers.
If you listen to their live shows which are all essentially the same tracksā¦some of them arenāt great.
Yes talent but mainly work.
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Hehā¦I do about 2000 tracks/loops a year on average. Iāve Been cataloguing the whole mess since I started in 98. Not one track/loop in there that I like, to date.
I actually feel like im getting worse.
Iām better at listenIng, over making.
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I know! I was almost disappointed when I loaded them up, nothing crazy, some basic modulation, occasionally linked tracks, the most wild thing was kicks starting on the 3. Otherwise it was just good programming and sounds.
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For me, I think thatās the toughest part. I have an absolutely SHITE sound palette. I tend to live in mud land. I TRY to deviate from what I pick and I find it hard.
When I listened to single tracks of the Ae sys and some of those sounds on their own I could never imagine going with. But within the mixā¦they are sick!
I have no clue how to find a way to climb out of the mud.
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Iāve mentioned this on another thread .
As I load up tracks into traktor to do mixes itās amazing how much simple derivative dull music is getting released .
Makes me think I shouldnāt be so hard on the stuff I write.
The act of finishing and releasing is a step forward , based on A LOT of tracks I go through recently we should all plough on and get stuff out there.
Just my opinion , not directed at autechre , hopefully more of an encouraging post to everyone to post their music.
Genuinely well regarded albums have many tracks that Iām tagging ācrapā so that I can easily delete it.
5 minutes of a 4/4 bass drum with slowly opening filter on a fart noise. DELETE
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To go off of what @re5et said, just because you donāt like it doesnāt mean others wonāt. I mean, Ae themselves donāt seem particularly impressed with their own work.
Rip it up and start again. Forget everything you normally do. Try something completely different and more importantly share it with us. Let us be the judges. I get the feeling you hold on to everything but itās only when we share stuff that we learn by putting our necks on the line and taking on suggestions. (I know youāre going to say itās not good enough for public consumption blah blah )
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for some reason my first thought goes to my bike racer friends: ādudeā¦ if I didnāt have to work, I could so go proā¦ā 
this. and if youāre not liking the sounds you design (what it kinda sounds like with your āmudā comment), use samples or presets or more basic machines*** that have more āestablishedā sounds which fit into a mix better. it may sound cheesy or like a shortcut, but it could also lead you to where you know what sounds youāre after and you can design them yourself in the future. more importantly, it may get you on a creative path and a better place with it mentally.
*** what I mean by this is that itās easy to make the Machinedrum sound bad (adore it, though I do). as mentioned above, Autechre know it, sound design, and what they want all well enough to not do that. if your sound design skills are making it (or whatever), sound bad, use something simpler with a wider sweet spot. like have you ever played a Juno 106 or SH-101? ALL sweet spot. hard to make 'em sound bad. donāt like your drums? try a TR-8S. etcā¦
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theyāre OLD werk, they said it was too simple. BUTā¦in old live footage their heads are bobbing. so they dug it at one point in time.
sure you outgrow your old shitā¦especially if you play it 40 times liveā¦and for a couple years till those tracks get phased out of your set.
and by the standards of what they do today, though I think with the patch they have created makes an easier path to making tunesā¦that yes their old stuff is simpler than todays.
but Iāve NEVER bobbed my head to my own shit, and to MEā¦that is the ultimate test. 
ive never wanted to make tunes for public. I just wanna make tunes I like. or make tunes I like with my bud, and share it with a couple of other buds. thatās it. no aspiration to make a record, play liveā¦I just wanna make cool tunes [in the vein I like]
unfortunatelyā¦the bar being Ae, MBM, AFX, BoCā¦crushes my soul ha ha haā¦
seeing that sysex inspired the fuck outta meā¦cuz I could understand what was going on.
and I THANK Ae for sharing, that was super cool of them. but, in the endā¦I still do what I do.
and I do CARE what they say [Ae]ā¦this is still super sickā¦
teach me how to get a kick to be punch and give that impression of pushing airā¦and iāll be happy.
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From the RA interview
Iām not a particularly intelligent person, me. Iām diligent, Iām pretty hardworking, but Iām not that clever. I aināt got any qualifications, I just pick up stuff that I think is interesting at the time. And is our music abstract and weird? To us or our mates itās not!
And there was some quote where - and Iām paraphrasing obviously - everyone thinks their music is complicated by it actually isnāt.
Anyway Iām a staunch believer that oneās worst critic is themself and canāt be trusted.
Found this looking for the quote:
I find punch best comes from a fast LFO on pitch.
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Recordto tape
Overload the bass drum
Just have highs and bass.
Push pads to left / right with stereo balance plugin
Gnarly .
That Lego feet track is nice. It didnāt need max/random/ā¦ just quite straight forward programming
If my stuff does go glitchy random and noise I also think āit sounds a bit like autechre and theyāre already doing it ā¦ much better, donāt botherā
Same reason I donāt do pads slightly out of tune with lots of reverb and children samples .
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agreeā¦but I canāt help but notice my benchmark candidates ārock outā to their music.
MBM totally get into it. cant say much for BoCā¦one I donāt think iāll ever get to see live.
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BOOTH The issue for me has always been that I can feel it. So I wonder sometimes whether our emotions are too subtle for people to pick up on. You canāt think that weāre not feeling it.
I mean, what would be the point in doing music if you werenāt feeling it?
there you have it.
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Doubt thatās what he meant.
Well at the very least youāre suffering so feeling something.
They always make a point of saying that they donāt both live in the same city anymore, and rarely make music in the same room (if at all) anymore. The nature of making everything in software means that they can basically just pass small files back and forth, possibly even via github or other version control platforms.
And then being able to take those same files out live means that they can make the exact same sounds onstage as they do in their studiosā¦ all on a laptop. I donāt think it matters how often they tour, bringing a $20k eurorack setup to Australia (for example 
) vs. taking a couple of laptops in carryon luggage makes a huge difference.
Shit, the more I write about it, the more it seems appealing 
might have to get back into Maxā¦
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When I approached them outside a gig once they both had backpacks on. I couldnāt stop staring at them thinking the universe I had just heard was in those bits of cloth.
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