Nowadays, Plaid's TRAINER sounds incredibly rough -- but for all its rough edges, it still manages to be ahead of its time, even the slightly embarrassing neo-rave of "Uneasy Listening." “A Slice of Cheese” is uncommonly good piece of lounge before the word was applied to every piece of downtempo out there, and “Link” and “Summit” show the melodic forwardness that made the Black Dog such a seminal group. And you can’t ignore the breaks on the Latin stormer, “Scoobs in Columbia,” that makes much of the current Latin explosion seem like nacho cheese. The unreleased “Chirpy,” “Prig” and “Eshish” shows aspects of IDM at its most beautiful Black Dog-esque heights (indeed, Ken Downie, Plaid’s former Black Dog mate, objected to the release of this material), and “Nort Route” is the perfect distillation of them. On the second disc, “The Whirling of Spirits” and “Choke and Fly,” originally released on the short-lived A.R.T. label, and “Small Energies,” continue this path. The driving “Letter” goes more tribal, while “Soft Key” veers in a more acidic direction and “Uland” goes back to mellow. The final two tracks, which appeared on the late, lamented Clear, lead us to the Plaid’s Warp days. “Android” has a soft electro feel into it, while “Angry Dolphin” is a little more breaks-oriented. If this is considered Plaid’s training, then it’s no wonder that they’re still running strong today.

This collection is obviously the building blocks of what we know now as Plaid. These guys continue to be way ahead of their time yet just on the edge of today. It is nice to finally be able to get some of these tracks on vinyl.

There are 15 Warp Test Pressings in existance of a 4xLP version of Trainer, which includes the Balil Parasight EP and the Black Dog Productions EP from Rising High which never made it to the final official Warp release due to licencing issues.

this represents some of Ed and Andy's best work - although I feel that some of the tracks could have involved Ken Downie such as the Balil tracks, rather than just Ed on his own. Despite my rating of 10/10, I do feel that they should be releasing new music instead of cashing in on old material.

What was intended to be a comprehensive collection disappoints with the disinclusion of essential early Black Dog tracks. Also, those who have tasted various MP3's of some of these tracks will discover inferior mixes and criminally short edits ("Uland" most notably).
Despite providing essential CD release of some classic tracks, those who know the back catalog better will be saddened by what's missing.

The whole oevre (most of them are hard to find tracks)of Plaid is released here on this compilation, it shows why that act became so successful in the IDM scene. Timeless music. Perfection in sounds since 1989. Yes, that is Plaid we love them for!