Mille Plateaux was the label that turned clicks-and-cuts into an international phenomenon

‘Clicks and cuts’ never existed as a genre in the strict sense — the article calls it a marketing term for works by artists bored with digital perfection. It cohered into an international phenomenon largely through a string of albums and compilations on Achim Szepanski’s Mille Plateaux label (Frankfurt), which set the aesthetic and critical agenda — some hailed it as the future, others dismissed it as ‘gallery techno.’ Peer labels including raster-noton (Alva Noto, Ryoji Ikeda) and 12K (Shuttle358) extended the reach. The takeaway: a scene’s coherence often comes from curatorial infrastructure (a label roster) rather than a strict genre definition.

Examples

Alva Noto’s ‘m 03’ (Mille Plateaux, 2001); Andreas Tilliander’s untitled LP (Mille Plateaux, 2001); Shuttle358’s ‘Frame’ (12K, 2000).

Assessment

Why does the article describe clicks and cuts as ‘a marketing term that described works’ rather than a genre? What structural role did Mille Plateaux play in creating that collective identity? Name one other label that extended the scene.