This came out in 1999 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
For this latest disc, brothers from another planet Paul and Phil Hartnoll say that instead of trying to write whole songs in one go, they just wrote individual bits — beginnings, middles, endings — as inspiration struck, then pieced them together into tunes like a sonic jigsaw puzzle.
You’d think the results would be disorganized and disjointed, but surprisingly, Middle Of Nowhere turns out to be much more than the sum of its parts. Their piecemeal approach to composition ironically creates an album that is more of a unified entity; the short sections and ever-evolving arrangements blur the borders between tracks until the whole affair becomes one long, pulsating, mutating, synthetic monster boogie of bleep-blooping boxes, block-rocking beats and buzzsaw effects. Dig the new funk-soul brothers.
