(07.20.08) Hailing from Italy comes a new electro label with a Marvel Comics edge. Villains Inc. is a new imprint of electro anti-heroes with a mission, to fill your speakers with their analogue tweaked brand of wickedness. So how have the masked marauders gotten on? Have they succeeded in infiltrating your vinyl collection? Or are these guys left lonely and ill cloaked on the damp streets of Gotham?
The caped electro men opened their secret hideout in 2007 with Gab.Gato, the label owner, teaming up with Matteo Merlo and Djako to release a split 12″ that was enjoyed by the underworld. Now, almost a year on, Gab.Gato is donning his hood and calling on XBeat to team up and get some new electro onto the streets; ‘No Light Or Shadow.’
The EP is a five-tracker, three co-lab pieces and two solos. The EP opens with Gab.Gato and XBeat locking horns over “No Light Or Shadow (Electro Mix.)” The track has all the elements of that classic low key Detroit sound. Machine beats are eroded as this duo push evil squelches at their listener whilst looming Ultradyne style vocals land. The track has a sinister fog drenched club feel, minimal and menacing in the Motor City scape. “No Light Or Shadow” follows and rocks the listener from their preconceptions established by A1. The machines are recalibrated and a reverberating acidic synthlines keeps with crisp beats. There is an immediate hit of UK Detroit about this work as vintage B12 or A.R.T. melody structures and sound dominate. The track is refreshing and gives the record greater scope, demonstrating what these two Villains are capable of.
B1 opens with the final tag team appearance, “Subterrania.” The track moves back into the smouldering dystopia of the city as analogue melodies are compressed and reconstituted. The piece has a less distinguishable quality than its predecessors, but holds an eerie urban isolation to it. The crusaders split for the remainder of the EP, with XBeat serving “Autobody” up first. Fuller beats and bass are the first main change, but the squalid 303esque chords return before breaks are injected to produce a solid and even work. Classic compu-vocode lyrics bring Gab.Gato’s “The Villains Inc.” to life. The beats are strong as disjointed autobahn melodies powerslide in. The track comes together well having more of a laid back tempo to “Autobody.”
No Light Or Shadow is an interesting release. On first putting needle to A1 it seems that this is going to be another Detroit inspired electro EP, but there is more to this 12″ than mere Motor City replication. The duo of Gab.Gato and XBeat offer up some sinister electro action, they also give some 90’s style UK techno as well as some faster and slower material. The EP is well conceived and holds itself, it is DJ friendly but has something for the headphone fanciers. A good second instalment by the Italian crusaders of the dark.
No Light Or Shadow is out now on The Villains Inc..
