While the electronic interweb buzzes with fervent exchanges about ‘Unite’, Burial’s latest audio-diffusion on Soul Jazz’s ‘Box Of Dub’ collection, and the preview of ‘Stairwell’ soon to be unwrapped on Kode9’s Sonar festival mix CD, even the most obsessive acolyte of the wraith-like producer has been unable to share their thoughts on ‘Ghost Hardware’ or the accompanying ‘Shutta’ and ‘Exit Woundz’ that make up this new EP, as even their very existence has remained a closely-guarded secret.

In a move calculated to avoid the intense hyperbole and digital ”sharing“ that would inevitably swarm over any fresh Burial material following the incredible impact on all critical fronts of last year’s eponymous debut album, these tunes have been kept behind firmly-locked doors, very deliberately unheard and unknown in all boroughs. There has been no specialist club DJ servicing, no targeted radio promotion, no extensive and on-going press campaign, no rinsed plays off acetate for the last 3 months at Forward… everyone gets to hear this music at the same time – when it’s on vinyl and in the shops. And that time is now.

The ‘Ghost Hardware’ EP does not represent any great stylistic shift by the planet’s most high-profile artistic recluse, yet neither does it languidly retread the paths already mapped... it is simply further first rate evidence of Burial's alchemic manipulation of mood, rhythm and sound. The ominous bass tones are as dense as they ever were, the strings still rise up from unexpected depths, and the disembodied siren voices sustain their mournful cries from the bleak empty quarters of consciousness, while those trademark rhythmic complexities continue to dance their intricate steps.