Nurse With Wound - The Surveillance Lounge (2009)

I took down the original review because I think it was misleading. I was in no way saying that the two artists I referenced, Aphex Twin and NWW, were similar in sound. What I was saying was that, using Aphex Twin as a widely known figure, and therefore a good reference point, the creation of this album and an Aphex Twin work, specifically Selected Ambient II, represented both a similar career move, and a similar challenge to the listeners. That career move is doing something out of character, or at least, something not in keeping with the perceived philosophy of a longstanding project. This album, being largely formulaic ambient and static, is interesting in its own right, but puzzling coming from NWW because countless, much less accomplished, artists could produce this. I used with Aphex Twin analogy because, at the time of SAW II, most people considered that "easy to make" and below par.

The second point on the challenge to the listener: when an established, cutting edge artist, gives you something that is superficially, and perhaps ultimately, average and formulaic, how are you to take it? Do you eschew the biases that would let you pan it were it produced under a different name? Do you relisten? Do you examine the notion of artists having cache and speculate as to the artist's subjective take on their work? In short, why do we give known artists breaks in some instance?

I feel that this work, taken on its own, is average, and have rated it as such. I gave it several trys because I respect NWW, and each time I enjoyed it, but was left with the same feeling. If you can understand my revised take on the album, I'd like to know what you think.