Newbuild

Raw, wrong and uninterested in behaving, Newbuild catches Manchester acid before the polish. 808 State sound like a group discovering machines and refusing to make them behave; Aphex reissued it on Rephlex for a reason. The unfriendliness is what makes it a document. The friendliness comes later; this is the scene before anyone learned manners.

The first British album where rave materials are built to album length, which is this page's own definition arriving before the tradition it defines. Raw acid doing more work than album construction, and being first is not the same as being best.