Matrixxman’s “Annika’s Theme” Is A Love Letter To Artificial Intelligence
Ghostly International will release the Bay Area producer’s debut album, Homesick, on July 10th.
What will the future look like? It's a question that's central not only to philosophy and science, but also to techno. Juan Atkins was influenced by futurist writer Alvin Toffler's 1980 book The Third Wave, Jeff Mills made a techno score for epic '20s sci-fi film Metropolis in 2000, and now, Bay Area producer Matrixxman has made an album that has as a core theme the rise of artificial intelligence. At the heart of Homesick, his debut LP on Ghostly International next month, is "Annika's Theme": an evocative slab of ambient techno that hums and bristles with Blade Runner-ish overtones.
"Annika is a prototype of artificial intelligence, or physical avatar rather, that is not fully realized," Matrixxman told The FADER of the story behind the track. "She is sentient and pulchritudinous in form, yet still in her social infancy stages. Despite nominal emotional hurdles, she is remarkably intelligent—as one might expect with AI—exhibiting a growing propensity towards learning the elusive intricacies of human intimacy, which marks significant progress for someone of her particular make and model." Ghostly will release Matrixxman's debut album, Homesick, on July 10th (pre-order it here).