Joel Ford tends to spend a lot of his time behind the scenes. You heard his playing all over Autre Ne Veut’s incredible 2013 album, Anxiety (one of our favorite albums of last year), and his sense of curation runs all the way through his (and Daniel Lopatin’s) Software label. Last year we heard him work on his new project, Ejecta, with Leanne Macomber of Neon Indian, but now he’s finally begun to step into the spotlight. “Connection To” is evidence of his strengths as a leading man, as it chugs for a steady six minutes, blending early techno traditions with a strikingly modern complexity. It sounds old, it sounds new, but more importantly it just sounds really damn good.

“Connection To” is out now via Driftless Recordings.