Actress' 'Radical Frame' Is a Patient, Corroded Masterclass in Electronic Space
Two of the eight tracks on Radical Frame are under fifteen seconds. One of them is four seconds long. That is not a gimmick — it’s Darren J. Cunningham telling you, before the record really starts, that he is going to control the clock himself.
The Sonic Breakdown
The Production & Mix
The Low-End: DJ Mag’s Paul Clarke flagged the most consequential change here: “a newfound clarity in the fidelity — expunging the bit-crushed hiss of earlier LPs.” The murk that defined the Ghettoville era has been pulled back, and what’s underneath turns out to be enormously physical. On “Overchord,” Clarke hears Naomi Kimpenu’s “yearning voice riding the sort of house beat Theo Parrish might produce if he was born in Wolverhampton.”
The Spatial Dynamics: The Quietus described the opening pair — “The Experiment” and “Gimme Tha’ Fuckin’ Money Man” — as “filtered, muffled, and distorted soundbites” that “echo their tracks’ titles,” two cryptic bursts that set a puzzle and then abandon it. Then “Live By You” arrives and, per the same review, “sucks the air out of the room until it caves in,” CASISDEAD’s raps “crumble and glitch, pummelled by a drilling syncopation.” Antonio Poscic’s summary is the best single line written about this producer in years: “Within the recognisable lo-fi confines of Actress’s sonic world, things never sound quite the same twice.”
Standout Performance
Rainy Miller on the sixteen-minute closer “Sheets.” DJ Mag called it “an absolute tour-de-force… making it one of the best things Actress has ever done, and one of the most astonishing pieces of electronic music we’ve heard in years.” The Quietus heard Miller’s line — “We can hold on to hope a little longer” — land “like a message left on an answering machine, one that reached you too late.”
Why It’s Certified
Because Cunningham built a thirty-eight-minute record whose second half is essentially one long tide going out, and made it the most inviting thing he’s done. Clash’s Shahzaib Hussain, scoring it 8/10, put it plainly: “Radical Frame is Actress at his most essential, mercurial and uncompromising. Often wordless and inscrutable, Cunningham is able to imbue this inter-dimensional work with feeling and intention.”
Put it on. Let “Sheets” run all the way to the waves.