Plastikman – Sheet One

Looks like there's a 30th anniversary remaster coming out on 1st Dec 2023 on biovinyl (oh dear!) ..fill ya boots peeps.

It's hard for me to fathom this is 30 years old now. The time just flies by. I clearly receiving the promo from Rich and company months before release and being the first to drop Spastik at an event in New York. Caffeine was the legendary Long Island techno venue and on this night they opened the 2nd floor warehouse garage. The audience went nuts to Spastik and it was quite clear to me then and there that this was going to be a massive hit. This album would also be a driving soundtrack on journeys playing raves up and down the East Coast back in 1993. Great memories!

Hawtin's studio genius shines through in the form of advanced drum progressions as well as melodies formed from the minimalist of warbles and squeaks from his trusty 303. Light in some parts, deeply heavy in others but in the main, tense and ethereal. Overall, an extraordinary album. This introduced me to Plastikman and minimal techno in general.

For those interested, the Sci-Fi samples on the later tracks are from the pilot episode of The Outer Limits called "The Galaxy Being".

Even though this is where it all started, in my humble opinion, the whole Plastikman frenzy has only gotten better with his subsequent releases. While the whole controversy around the acid tab cover art only helped raise the hype, music wise, "Sheet One" contains two timeless classics: Plasticity and Plasticine. Those tunes aside, I don't find the other tracks to be note worthy. In brief, this is a historically important release, the debut album of Richie Hawtin's most famous alias, and thus it is well worth owning, if for nothing else, then for the fabulous cover art. But for those who feel like really finding out what Plastikman is about, I suggest you move on to "Musik" and the essential "Recycled Plastik EP". When you've assimilated everything those have to offer, then you can slowly move into his darker and moodier albums such as "Artifakts". For an introductory release to this highly prolific artist, this should satisfy the average acid and/or minimal techno freak. However, don't miss out and stop here!

Excellent record and acid landmark!... but the real interesting story was that apparently (2) ravers on their way back from some desert based U.S. rave were pulled over and the sheet from 'Sheet One' was outside of the plastic case and the cops that pulled them over thought it was an actual sheet of acid and locked them up for a few days. Can you think of a better marketing ploy? Oh and by the way the record is ace. Richie Hawtin at his finest. Acieeed!

There was a great urban myth when this first came out that some of the sheets which made up the covers for these were actual tabs. The idea of people eating their CD covers just in case has to be one of the great marketing campaigns of acid house....

Okay everything has been written and said and taken with this cornerstone in electronic music.
But i really want to emphacize on Plasticine, which is probably the closest music can get to drugs.
An incredible 11 minutes-long subtle acid trip, which is not only mentally and hypnotically blowing but also drills in a very simple, emotional yet tense little tune that remains deep in your cortex forever.
The perfect alliance of hypnose and melodic simplicity, this is pure genius.

THE definitive minimal acid album which introduced a huge amount of people to the underground techno phenomenon. All about continuous, subtling changing percussion, and drifting, warping 303 acid lines that never get disturbingly squelchy like so many who tried to follow. Sickeningly repetitive, with just enough to keep the ear tickled so that it doesn't get bored, and very long slow buildups that eventually explode into a liquid dancer's fantasy land, this album will live in dance music infamy forever.