OPM: Sonic Cinematic

Negative Agent – Terminal Days

High-octane industrial metal in the tradition of prime-era Ministry and KMFDM. Heavy riffs, brutal beats, growling vocals, and lots of topical samples from films, TV, and the like. It’s not all backward-looking tho – while it certainly honors the aforementioned titans of the genre, there are plenty of newer influences and fun twists to be found in the all-out aural assault. 

Finding those little twists and turns is definitely part of the fun here. A cool reminder of the kind of records Al and pals used to make, with a modern twist and a nice message: Explicitly anti fascist, unrelentingly heavy, and ready to get heads banging and faces melting. 

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DeN+ – “Outside the Controlled Zone”

Unusual and intriguing cinematic instrumental electro: funky and weird and a bit sinister. There are some serious sound design and production chops on offer, and this sounds for all the world like it should be soundtracking a scene in some kind of futuristic heist thriller (or game version of same). 

I frankly haven’t heard a better use of metallic filter sweeps and heavily syncopated beats in years. Check it out, and note that if you dig it, there’s an album with seven more pieces in a presumably similar vein.

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Honkey Bitch – Dances With Demons

Wild-eyed, woolly experimental rock for the real weird ones out there. Nodding to Tom Waits, Captain Beefheart, Zappa, Mr. Bungle and plenty of other dudes whose talent was matched only by their extremely eccentric approaches to rock music, lyrics, and, presumably, life itself. Wouldn’t sound out of place playing a dive bar in a John Waters film, or maybe in a fever dream. 

Weird, skeletal arrangements; fractured rhythms; off kilter guitars squalling away in loose coordination; shouted, growled, and purred vocals. To say this won’t be for everyone is deeply understating things, but those who click with this will be overjoyed to have found it – this is rare stuff. 

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Jazzaria – “Sesquialtera”

A groovy, shifting bit of jazzy downtempo that sounds like the best soundtrack to an underwater level in all of gaming. Some intriguing sound design, elastic rhythms, and a great atmosphere position this track to succeed – the musicality brings it home. A lovely reminder that jazz, downtempo, and atmospheric electronica are three great tastes that pretty much always taste great together. 

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Six Umbrellas – Back to Work

Super high-energy and high impact blend of electro, breakbeat, acid, and other flavors of vintage electronica. This really feels like a celebration of the heady days of early electronica breaking to the mainstream in late ‘90s America (I know the UK was way ahead of us). It was a time when Big Beat was inescapable, raves were happening across the country, and the gods of rock felt the first tidings of their imminent demise. 

For those of us that were there, this makes for a powerful nostalgic – a high almost as good as the pills we got back then (okay, not really, but YKWIM). For those who missed it? A history lesson that will have you shaking your ass – the best kind of history lesson.  

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