Release and Reception
| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| CokeMachineGlow | (59%) |
| Music Emissions | (favourable) |
| PopMatters | (mixed) |
| Tiny Mix Tapes | |
The E.P. was released as a free download from the Placid Casual website on 12 April 2004. Along with the three tracks that make up the E.P. the promotional music video for "Slow Life" was also available to download in QuickTime and Windows Media Video formats. Limited quantities of the E.P. were also issued on CD, bundled with initial copies of remix album Phantom Phorce on its release on 19 April 2004. The CD version was housed in a floppy disk style picture sleeve.
Critical reaction was generally mixed with Cokemachineglow calling the EP "forgettable", stating that, while "Slow Life" "slides perfectly off Phantom Power", the other two tracks are weak: "Motherfokker" is a vulgar "Pez candy up the nose" with "shoddy guest rapping" from Goldie Lookin Chain and "Lost Control" is barely more than a remix of Phantom Power track "Out of Control". PopMatters also dismissed "Motherfokker" and "Lost Control" as inessential b-sides and, during their review of 2007's Hey Venus!, the NME suggested that "Motherfokker" is "best-suppressed".
"Slow Life" itself received generally positive reviews; Pitchfork Media called it a "stunning closer" to Phantom Power, while PopMatters described the song as "the kind of schizophrenic fun we've come to expect from the band but ... less showy and eager to please, as they control themselves enough to make the jarring, contradicting styles much easier to digest". Stylus Magazine stated that the "great" track "achieves symbiosis between techno and guitar-pop better than anything else they've done before". The BBC agreed calling "Slow Life" the band's "most successful mindrattling techno attempt so far". The song was placed at number 46 in the 2003 Festive Fifty on John Peel's BBC Radio 1 show.
Read more about this topic: Slow Life
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