Tusk Mite :: P H ▽ T I S M S (Concrete Collage)

It’s easy enough to get lost in the surreal and mind-numbing speed at which each piece cruises, yet if you dive in just a little farther, a myriad of complex and flickering melodies float just below its roughened edges.

Seemingly bent and fractured to the core

Thousands upon thousands of frenetic drill’bass beats migrate around softer tones and evaporated glitch streams on these dozen tracks by Erik Kiviharju (aka Tusk Mite) for Concrete Collage. It’s easy enough to get lost in the surreal and mind-numbing speed at which each piece cruises, yet if you dive in just a little farther, a myriad of complex and flickering melodies float just below its roughened edges.

The development of sound structures, while seemingly bent and fractured to the core, still manages to inspire and captivate. Starting from the end, “Finale” aligns with some of Squarepusher’s best; its symphonic soundscape and emotional pull is perhaps the highlight of the lot. “Avalon” and “Morph” bring back early 00s-era spastic electronic sculptors like Eight Frozen Modules and Bogdan Raczynski. And yet with all of the sporadic crunching and audio mulching beauty featured here, brief sonic eclipses like “Too Close,” “Autumn Continuum,” and the aptly titled “Last Lullaby” showcase the Finland-based musicians ability to craft glitch’n breaks worlds that somehow draw us into its vortex. Explosive breakcore moods are often submerged in atmospheric shades, like a pro. Not to exclude the ethereal beauty and ambient swells on the rather short run-time of “Aeons,” which we could repeat on a loop for hours, P H ▽ T I S M S is jam-packed with gems just waiting to be unearthed.

P H ▽ T I S M S is available on Concrete Collage. [Bandcamp]