Aphex Twin - Windowlicker

Aphex Twin's Windowlicker is one of electronic music's great oddities, a 1999 single that smuggled warped, funky R&B into the UK top 20.

Richard D. James was already the scene's chief prankster when he released it through Warp, and the Chris Cunningham-directed video, a savage parody of flashy hip-hop clips, made the record infamous. The single reached number 16 in the UK and was named NME's single of the year, an unlikely crossover for a producer better known for far more challenging and abrasive work.

The title track is a marvel of controlled chaos: lush, almost romantic chords, gasping vocal samples and breakbeats chopped so finely they seem to stutter and melt. Behind the strangeness sits a melody sweet enough to hum, which is exactly what makes the whole thing so disorienting and so addictive.

The second track, titled with a lengthy mathematical formula, hides an image of James's face in its spectrogram, a prank only visible with the right software. "Nannou" closes things gently, built from wind-up music box samples and sounding like a lullaby from another planet.

More than 25 years on, this three-track 12-inch still sounds like nothing else, a perfect introduction to one of electronic music's most restless and inventive minds.