by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Gordon Chapman-Fox moves onto his fourth album under the alias Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan, which finds him in a conflicting position. “I’m nostalgic for an optimistic future”, he writes on his Bandcamp page, pining for the time when the future really did seem a boundless set of opportunities rather than a state in which to be fearful.

As before this is a wholly solo album, one man and his electronics – but painting vistas far beyond those means.

What’s the music like?

Wonderfully moody. There are some dark thoughts here, shot through with a windswept beauty that gives them impressive grandeur.

The stern countenance of Just Off The M56 (J12) sets the slightly industrial scene, and though the initial impressions are stern, the way Chapman-Fox works his ideas together brings out the optimism in his thinking as the synth line cuts through the cloudy texture.

There is a winsome elegance here, very English in its restrained but telling emotion, coming through most obviously in the excellent Rocksavage, with its steadily oscillating figures, and then allowed more mechanical energy on Thelwall Viaduct.

Chapman-Fox secures a wonderful ebb and flow, and on brooding soundscapes such as London’s Moving Our Way there is a sinister undertow bringing John Carpenter to mind, not to mention a powerful sense of occasion.

Meanwhile Europa Boulevard presents a colder climate, the airiness and relative dead air of industry captured in music, though it soon warms up when extra layers are added.

Does it all work?

It does. These are vivid evocations of cityscapes that we would maybe rather not have but which are an intrinsic part of English life. Chapman-Fox treats them with respect but also highlights their unexpected angles of beauty. There is also, in the closing A Brighter And More Prosperous Future, a stern yet assured hope for better times ahead.

Is it recommended?

Very highly. This music has its roots in the 1980s, and the likes of Cabaret Voltaire or John Foxx, but Warrington-Runcorn Development Plan is a gateway to some accomplished and very meaningful electronic music.

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