Scanner, I've come to realize, is just another one- trick pony. He started out as the scourge of mobile phone users throughout London. With his, erm, scanner, he'd intercept telephone calls and record them. His early releases mixed understated ambient with sometimes hilarious, sometimes disturbing conversations. As more and more art types picked on the tantalizing piquancy of Scanner's voyeuristic plundering of the airwaves, he got a residency at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. It was then that it really became taboo to mention that, if the emperor was wearing any clothes at all, they were pretty provocative.

The only unpredictable element in a Scanner track or remix is, invariably, the crassness of those whose conversations he'd trapped. That's why it comes as no surprise that when he removes all the phone stuff-- as he does on Lauwarm Instrumentals (apart from a nervous public announcement from a London Underground official)-- the disc is left starkly unremarkable.

The first release on Scanner's Sulfur Records was the fascinating Future Pilot AKA vs. A Galaxy of Sound, which along with the Pastels' Illuminati remix album raised the bar for remix albums. So, for Sulfur's second release, the boss tosses off a record pretentiously entitled Lauwarm Instrumentals, lacking the balls to translate that German word-- it'd be too revealing.

As one might expect, it actually does translate to "lukewarm," and it's exactly that type of instrumental he continually offers up here. The 12- minute cinematic drum-n-bass of "Lithia Water" wouldn't be out of place on one of Bill Laswill's less- than- stellar Oscillations albums. "Immemory" premieres Scanner's unholy fantasy of Terry Riley jamming "Poppy Nogood" with Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight" thumping percussion. "Sonnenlicht" strongly recalls "The Garden is Full of Metal,” Scanner's sublime tribute to avant- garde British film- maker Derek Jarman and arguably Scanner's most heartfelt work to date. The track unfurls at a slow, slow pace, like a 40 bpm slice of Autechre. But a needless clatter of Arts Council- approved beats disrupts the austere beauty so wastefully.

"Passage de Recherche" also harkens back to the days before Scanner believed his reviews in Installation Art Today magazine. An orderless succession of found sounds erupt and dissipate as a lugubrious background balances out the chaos. Yet Scanner plays the idea for far too long, and whatever point he's attempting to make is subducted beneath impatience.

Yet I find it hard to be thrilled by an album that is essentially just a plea for a soundtrack gig. Scanner is a musician crying out for accompanying visuals to carry his material. In a year when Orbital raised my roof with The Middle of Nowhere and Autechre's EP7 consolidated their position as the Lewis and Clark of electronic music, it's tragic that the corral of the one- trick pony welcomes yet another mule.

-Paul Cooper