(10.15.04) Last year I found a used copy of Hypnoskull’s Operation Tough Guy!, I bought it but
I wasn’t much impressed, I thought it was a bit old-fashioned and too much
industrial for my taste. Plus, I couldn’t stand Hypnoskull screaming like a madman
every coupla minutes. For this reason, when this Dark Skies Over Planet E landed in
my stereo, I didn’t expect much. And I was very very wrong.
The two albums are 2 years distant but it seems it’s a
decade. This latest effort still retains the peculiar sound of Hypnoskull, enriched
with breakcore influences, groovy breaks and some pleasant collaborations. Most
important of all, Patrick Stevens stopped yelling: maybe some hardcore fans
will be disappointed, but it’s much more appealing for youngsters like me.
Hypnoskull is aware of the changes of his sound and in the booklet you can find a disclaimer that explains his change of direction.
But let the music speak. To start, there’s three great pieces, the gloomy
industrial title track, the ultra fast breakcore of “The Frozen Army Of
Drummachines” and finally “Terrostress,” that sounds like an accelerated
Producer tune. Then there’s “Elektromutant,” the name says it all –an electro
piece made up with industrial drums and the addition of nice robotic vocals. It’s
with the help of tracks like this, “Don’t Mess With The Big S” and “Assault Code
Free The Floors” that Hypnoskull creates a fresh, highly recommended album. The
first is a dark hip-hop moment, while the latter is a mash-up of breakcore and
heavy-metal, a fashionable combo nowadays, just listen to Otto Von Schirach,
Doormouse or even the recent Kattoo to find some excellent examples.
There’s plenty of wicked stuff here, but I will mention only a few. Closing the
album is a long experimental track: Hypnoskull asked 100 people around the
world to send him 5 seconds of audio, of any kind, breaks, drones, baby voices,
traffic noises, etc. –he assembled all the pieces and and the result can
be found here. After the proper album there’s six bonus tracks, six collaborations
between Hypno and people around the world. There’s the industrial monster
“Nostalgia,” w/ Act Dramatik, “Shift Break,” a weird hardcore jungle tune
featuring Needle Sharing and Patrick singing, but the most interesting of all is
“Let’s Hear It For The Hardcore!” with rising breakcore star Sickboy: the noisy
mash-up assault will leave you breathless.
Dark Skies Over Planet E is a must have for fans of Ant-Zen sister label Mirex,
since it’s not that far from artists like Fanny, Sickboy or Hellfish and Producer.
Dark Skies Over Planet E is out now on Ant-Zen.
