Erratic and unsettling yet undeniably gripping, this set builds upon warped foundations of industrial dub, mutated jungle, and disfigured hip-hop structures. It’s an excavation—reaching backward while marching toward a future of controlled chaos and sculpted dissonance.
Brooding sub-bass pressure
Plunging into murky depths of dub distortion and detuned drone-scapes, Monochrome Vol. 2: Tentacles Of Spiritual Contagion (via Minneapolis-based Phage Tapes, July 2025) explores a scorched wasteland of delaminated drum machines, corroded breaks, and spectral rhythms clawing through the mix. Described by Andrew Nolan as “a home for lost, abandoned, and barely heard tracks,” this collection traverses raw terrain—gritty downtempo dub colliding with molten electronic currents, pulsing somewhere in nocturnal limbo.
Each cut bears a backstory, hinted at in the Bandcamp liner notes—live artifacts, rekindled collaborations, unearthed inspirations—featuring sonic architects like Like Weeds, Xicada, New Villain, KNG Bondalero, Stalingrad, and nods to Throbbing Gristle’s subterranean lineage. What unfolds is a bristling tapestry of saturated rhythm architecture, brooding sub-bass pressure, and illbient haze soaked in Scorn and Witchman-style grime.
Erratic and unsettling yet undeniably gripping, this set builds upon warped foundations of industrial dub, mutated jungle, and disfigured hip-hop structures. It’s an excavation—reaching backward while marching toward a future of controlled chaos and sculpted dissonance. Highlights flicker into view: the jarring entry point “Rise of the Consultants (version) (feat Stalingrad),” smoke-drenched dub in “Back Seat Driver,” molten drag of “This Splendid Hell (feat Xicada & Like Weeds),” haunted layers in “The Stars That Eat the Decaying Carcass of the Sky,” rusted jungle rush in “Hijack the Airwaves,” sharpened precision of “A Trick of the Shadows (version),” and reverb-heavy menace in “Onkalo.”
Each track smolders like a transmission from forgotten timelines—drenched in ruin, yet pulsing with razor-sharp intent.
Monochrome Vol. 2: Tentacles of Spiritual Contagion is available on Phage Tapes. [Bandcamp]
