The greatest myth Aphex Twin ever perpetuated
For many, the draw to Aphex Twin’s oeuvre of skewed electronica is the mythos he drapes himself with.
Not that his hype supplants the music. Of all the DJs and bleepers that flocked to Sheffield’s Warp Records in the early 1990s, Richard D James was the figure that encapsulated the so-called IDM wave that would score the experimental and rave underground before finding further life in the mainstream via Björk and Radiohead’s LP efforts by the end of the decade.
Across his extensive discography, all manner of disparate programmed flavours would be twisted and crumpled into James’ creations. Let alone his gallery of aliases from Polygon Window, AFX, and The Tuss, James would hoard everything from blasting industrial din, ambient soundscapes, drill ‘n’ bass rave, and jaunty surrealism to colour his expert electronic conjurings, swiftly becoming the grinning face of the whole Warp wave.
Yet, his artful obfuscations indeed helped. Alongside the lauded videos for ‘Come to Daddy’ and ‘Windowlicker’ with director Chris Cunningham, a fascination with James as a mischievous Puck throwing cherry bombs of lies, rumours, and tall tales to a naive press all added to his mysterious appeal. Was he a twin? Did he own a tank? Was he making music at age 14, as 1992’s Selected Ambient Works 85-92 suggested? Whether in earnest lore weaving or simply to stave off boredom during an interview, such mistruths formed an inextricable element to Aphex Twin’s cult of personality.
Before long, James was elevated to a weird entity, an impish agent of chicanery that married perfectly with his elastic and unpredictable synth-soaked sleight of hand. Sifting through his greatest ever myth is quite the task, considering his endless bag of facts is in serious need of citations. There’s plenty to choose from. From telling an MTV journalist in 1994 that he wanted to hire a cruise ship and play special shows in whatever ports took his fancy, working in a coalmine at 17 to afford his first hardware, or whether he did in fact witness a man die in an Elephant and Castle greasy spoon.
The best porkies always contain a semblance of plausibility. For whatever reason, it’s the fanciful snapshots of James bored in the house one day and dreaming up something mad or stupid to simply pass the time that often endure the deepest when assessing Aphex Twin’s japerry.
Among a torrent of bollocks in an interview with Sonic Envelope, including Foetus’s Jim Thirwell threatening to kill him and attempting to construct a hydraulic bed like The Exorcist, the simplest and most hilarious is the claim that he impulsively sent a hefty chunk of his own hair to his father. Whether such a gift was purported to be appreciated was unclear, but it was a ruse that James continued with comic evolution, telling NME in 1995 he chopped his beard off in an attempt to encourage hair growth on his toes, then a year later reporting wanting to include pieces of his beard in the first 100 copies of Richard D James Album.
All good fun. Whether beard hair shenanigans or violently shaking beds, Aphex Twin’s artful bullshit stands alongside his penchant for dancing teddy bears and on-stage female bodybuilders, and the music world wouldn’t want it any other way.
