24→24 Music

The album is an improvised composition grounded in disco but characterized by rhythmic shifts every 24 bars, with Russell running the recordings through two 24-track tape recorders set up by producer Bob Blank.[1] The recording featured a large number of musicians, including the Ingram Brothers band.[2] It was recorded at Blank Tapes studio in June 1979, with the exception of "#7," recorded in April at the New York avant-garde venue the Kitchen,[3] where the material was initially performed.[4] Steven Hall later described its first performance: "it was like really hot dance music and no one got it. The idea that Arthur would turn around and bring that music into their venue and present it as serious music was really very challenging to them, and very threatening to them."[4]

The first limited pressing of this record had a hand-made silk-screened cover.[4] Tracks from the album received significant airtime at New York clubs thanks to DJ Larry Levan, a friend of Russell.[5]

The album was reissued on CD in 2007 with bonus tracks, and again as a box-set in 2011 featuring rare full-length remixes.[5]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[1]
Pitchfork	7.5/10[2]
Record Collector	[6]

AllMusic called the album Russell's "most delightful" work, and described it as exploring "the blurry hinterlands where disco, downtown avant improv, new music, and funk meet no wave playfulness."[1] Following its reissue, Pitchfork stated that the album "falls in a long line of deserved reissues" of Russell's work, and called it "disco at its loosest, warmest, and weirdest".[2] Melody Maker called it "a fluid, constantly shifting piece of music that’s intensely danceable and spacially disorientating at the same time."[7]

Credits adapted from liner notes.[8]