ARTHUR RUSSELL

Picture Of Bunny Rabbit (Rough Trade/Audika)

Arthur Russell is the polymath-cellist-chameleon who died too soon and could turn his hand to any style of music and make it completely his own: disco, country, Buddhist mantras, straight-up pop, you name it (there’s probably an album’s worth of black metal experiments in the vault somewhere). Picture Of Bunny Rabbit, a set of previously unreleased material recorded in 1985, is one of the more challenging groupings of Russell’s songs.

On the surface this collection continues in the same vein as Russell’s much-loved 1986 album World Of Echo, all cyclic waves of cello and reverb-soaked vocals. But lurking at the heart of this compilation is the title track, its misleadingly sweet-sounding name masking a bizarre instrumental full of what sounds like electronically-treated viola pitch-shifted out of existence. It sounds like John Cale meets, I don’t know, Squarepusher? Considering that this music was recorded in 1985, it’s quite staggering indeed. I can’t wait to see what Audika/Rough Trade uncover next from the late composer’s vault – for now this is essential stuff.

words ADAM JONES