Security Screenings

Scott Herren has grown into an iconoclast who resists the ingrained nature of releasing full-length-album statements every two to four years. Instead, during his career he has released several mini-albums, which are good ways to get more music into the market and put less of your reputation on the line. (After all, mainstream music critics need to take LPs seriously, but not EPs or singles.) Security Screenings, which arrived just one year after his last full-length, is light on collaborative tracks (only two) and very light on vocals (none whatsoever, besides a few random samples and the ironic inclusion of the low lights from a Prefuse interviewer who objects to the predominance of vocal tracks on 2005's Surrounded by Silence). Midway through the second track, Herren's patented glitchy hip-hop lurches into life like Frankenstein's monster reanimated in yet another sequel. Interestingly, however, it doesn't last long, and Herren revisits it only twice more during the record's 40 minutes. (Another clue to Herren's state of mind would be his title for one of those tracks: "Keeping Up with Your Quota.") The Prefuse of past years is replaced by plenty of airy distortion (reminiscent of his work with the Books and his side project, Savath + Savalas), and nods to the hip-hop beatwork of his early Warp records.