Back in January 2015, a slew of what seemed like Aphex Twin demos surfaced on SoundCloud, only to be pulled and re-emerge elsewhere on the internet. Over several days, the legendary producer upped 269 unreleased tracks – a move he himself described in our Crack Magazine cover story as “amazing”.

As it turns out, Richard D. James had been thinking about his mortality. “I’ve got all this music and I thought if I died what the fuck would my kids do?” he said. “What would my wife do? They’d get really stressed out and they wouldn’t know what to do with it all. So I just thought I’d give it away, then they don’t have to think about it.” And yet, as he added, “The thing is I haven’t even started.”

For Aphex Twin fans, the dump was significant for more than its accumulative mass of listening material; it indicated a growing openness from the elusive artist. Shrouded in mystery, Aphex’s work was wrapped up in his troll-like tongue-in-cheek behaviour, often not offering much information of himself away in interviews – if they were granted at all.

In celebration of our November cover star, we asked Norwegian producer and SHAPE Platform affiliate EOD, aka Stian Gjevik, to sift through Aphex’s infamous SoundCloud dump – and stitch its best moments together into one mix. Why did we think EOD was up to the task? Gjevik is reputed for his forward-facing, intricate IDM, release through labels like bbbbbb, which owes a certain debt to the ground Aphex Twin has broken throughout his career. More significantly, it’s a debt that was repaid when Aphex Twin signed EOD to his own – now defunct – label, Rephlex. Under the imprint, James released two of the artist’s key works: EOD Volume 1 and 2.

With an in-depth understanding of Aphex’s work, who better to lead this deep dive into the work of Richard D. James. We think it’s a good one too, an hour-long mix from EOD that showcases the boundless dexterity of Aphex Twin, and makes room for some of the weirder moments; from ambient textures to bodily sounds and, of course, some searing acid.

Find all of our Aphex Twin-related features in one place, via our portal.

Tracklist
(throatie)
@FX – ChatterwavesTRIXT2
scorrier
bpjdrop forge
high hats tune tamclap orig
gerald remix
lannerlog
subCan
dual acid ab6
MTG edit eq
heliosphan live
T08+4
fork rave
fresher + cleaner
notting hill bus
cottage3 e
mello punchy
cutting
autumn travels
floating
179 brk 2
ibiza spliff