Devikorps
Injektion Site
X-IMG
Few labels do techno-industrial crossover like the Berlin-based X-IMG, due in no small part to the in-house output of label head SARIN. His collaborative efforts with producer HUREN under the name Devikorps have yielded the LP Injektion Site, following a template further afield from the body crossover sounds the label has often dealt with for a more abrasive and textural style of music. The record has DJ set contenders for certain – “Mobile Morgue” and “Coke Stroke” both have fast moving rhythm programming mixed with screeching mechanical sounds and unsettling vocal samples – but much of its appeal lies in the tracks that go further afield. “Herz Aus Glas” is all low thrumming bass, filtered kicks and unintelligible voices with occasional snaps of noise cutting through the obscurity. “Boots on the Ground” is built on a foundation of pounding percussion that staggers and halts unexpectedly, the washes of noise and overlapping reverbs amping up the tension with each passing moment. Interestingly Devikorps do go in for some industrialized funk on “Don’t Make Eye Contact”, albeit with a different approach then you might expect: almost two minutes of sound design and mangled samples elapse before a wormy bassline and syncopated drums come together for a leftfield groove to form.
Corvx
Dark Judgment
self-released
A rebooted iteration of Ben Arp’s C/A/T side hustle Corvx de Timor, Corvx takes that project’s witchy and downtempo sound and crosses it with some crunchier steez of the current techno-industrial style. The result’s an EP of rhythmically mechanical but also icy and organic beats, which in some ways circles back to some of the sounds Arp first cut his teeth on. The four tracks on Dark Judgment sit in the mid-tempo range, and while they’re almost entirely dependent upon sustained rhythms Arp finds a whole host of creepy-crawly textures which set each of them in very distinct contexts. “Death” has a stripped-down, film-noir menace while the echoes and drones which accompany “Fear”‘s bass could sound at home on a 3 Teeth track just as easily as on a classic rhythmic industrial joint. Despite all these different points of reference, Dark Judgment carries a nicely unified feel, offering a solid grounding in what we can perhaps expect from the next phase of Arp’s work.
