This is an EP packed full of heavy hitting, bloodshot eyed, uncompromising slammers. Past and present mashed together into a bitter pulp of goodness, cruelty hovering in the wings to add in an extra kick when necessary.
The digging up of house has uncovered other skeletons in the electronic music closet and the dust has settled and clung. Whilst Chicago is renowned for a certain sound, other countries were exploring burgeoning styles. In the 80s Europe took on the mantle of EBM. Industrial. New Beat. Synth. Of course no man is an island and styles bled and blended. Today there is an even greater interplay of genres but the dust is ever present. Underproduction. The move toward distortion and grit has increased has become the norm. Contort Yourself is a label that illustrated this shift to the home-made, or this shift to the strained, with its excellent Decapitated One Liners. The 12” garnered a huge amount of praise, and rightfully so. But a good first act can be hard to follow, so how does Events at the Fatal Party shape up?
The opening is from the Hamburg partnership of Fallbeil. “Brutal Ignorant” enters and hammers. Percussion serrates and 303 teeth bite. The backdrop is blurred with fogged out undecipherable lyrics, wraiths twisting under a New Beat infused techno. The clock is rolled back some thirty years as Die Form take over. “Fear the Bloody night” and “Hurt” originally came out on tape back in ’85, but sound as fresh today as they did just after I was born. Vocals stagger into taut tones, rusting rifts infecting beats as a coarse and dishevelled style is cast. L.I.E.S. veteran Slugbug opens the flip and takes his cue from Die Form. Sour synth pierced with snare and doused in sorrow. The end comes from the gnarled fingernails of Jamal Moss. Under his IBM hood the Chicagoan melts down the original and gives it a bit of a Damian Hirst-ing. The original is bludgeoned and buckled as Mr Moss takes knife to the neck, leaving nothing but bloody noses, blurry eyes and bruised ribs.
If you enjoyed the first installment from Contort Yourself get ready to smile again. This is an EP packed full of heavy hitting, bloodshot eyed, uncompromising slammers. Past and present mashed together into a bitter pulp of goodness, cruelty hovering in the wings to add in an extra kick when necessary.
Events at the Fatal Party is available on Contort Yourself.
