One simply cannot pigeonhole UnknownDivide, and maybe that’s the intention. When sparks like “Reverence” punctuate your soul and the title track pierces our ventricles, one can only imagine where we’ll be taken next.
Broken, scattered, and eroded beats form the foundation of these evocative pieces
In 2018 with UknownDivide’s Instinct, we described this album as “beat-driven downtempo, textured techno flurries, and heavier rhythmic patterns,” and if Existence is any indication as to where Derrick Stembridge—also responsible for ambient/drone Drifting In Silence project—is headed, then we’re queued up and ready. For those that recall Gridlock’s post-industrial and emotive electronic past (ref. Formless, Hymen 2003), Existence traverses familiar terrain. Broken, scattered, and eroded beats form the foundation of these evocative pieces. “Unreal” and “Below” are classic examples where shuffling drums coalesce and are pulled together by guitar strings and ambient drifts. Synthesizers and modular acrobatics take shape on “False,” an upfront and direct downtempo transition as “Transmission” delves knee-deep in harder edged technoid spheres. But just when you thought you were getting Existence, the tracks begin to degrade and fragment blissfully. Take “Limitless,” as a reference where crunchy drums and floating dronescapes migrate into pseudo-drill’n bass flutter. In other words, one simply cannot pigeonhole UnknownDivide, and maybe that’s the intention. When sparks like “Reverence” punctuate your soul and the title track pierces our ventricles, one can only imagine where we’ll be taken next.
Existence is available Labile. [Bandcamp]
