It’s always seemed important to Plaid that they set themselves outside any idea of “electronica” and make whatever occurs to them. They work with instrumentalists, singers, DJs—whoever helps them push out the boat. One way to understand Plaid is that they place a high premium on a very human kind of swing, and their vision of machine music rarely wanders into the pressure drill territory of Aphex Twin and Autechre. They feel more in the tradition of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and various strains of mellow hip-hop. Their vision is one of the sunniest in IDM, and their albums make a case for IDM that has compositional coherence that isn’t dystopic or heavy.

– Sasha Frere-Jones