seven

i guess this is what happens if you come to electronic music (or industrial) from any other genre than disco, pop, or electronic. you will be bound to go back and discover the bands that influenced industrial/electronic acts of today. this is inevitable if you want to understand where the genre is going tomorrow and where it came from. as a result, you might suddenly discover that this or that band is sampling from skinny puppy or the who or something else. i am not sure whether this is good or bad - it has both effects on me personally - it might either ruin the song or i might enjoy it even more knowing, for instance, that beefcake sampled haujobb or fla sampled fsol.

well, here you go - deadcities - a wonderful discovery, a gem hidden from me by the industry labels attached to it ("pop" and "techno"); it is only when you shed those off, you can fully enjoy this album. "deadcities" is incredibly rich, dense and complex album. it resembles me "implode" by front line assembly, modified and softened.

it starts off with "herd killing" - could be easily mistaken for fla track with its dark basslines, sampled guitar and overall menacing feeling; disjointed beats and occasional funky noises make a nice mix. "dead cities" - a dark techno track that starts with menacing bass and dark technoid sounds, it gets interrupted by clean beautiful synthlines. soon the track wanders off into the strange and unknown world of noises, funky drum loops, and weird sounds. the sound is incredibly rich and changing: clean and quiet, the music might suddenly become dark and menacing retaining its constant flow. "we have explosives" - nice repetitive drum'n'bass-like piece with constant rhythm and nicely sampled guitar. funky, noisy and quite entertaining (and again - fla sampled beats from this track - so listen carefully). "my kingdom" - another famous song; it has an oriental feeling to it with chimes, strange instruments, soft melody, beautiful chorus, and nice warm exotic touch.

the rest of the songs on the album continue the journey into the exotic, strange and rich world of pure electronic music. the songs are soft, dense, and complex. this album might be a bit too much for that harsh uncompromising industiral ear (hehe..), but it is example of brilliant pure electronic composition that simply cannot be overlooked by anyone that has something to do with electronic music. "deadcities" is one of those timeless classics that sound fresh and innovative even today.