Post Content
“Post Content” is a brutal beast hell-bent on reliving its acid-induced days of old; a static-fuelled attack that causes major carnage wherever it may roam, and it’s always on the brink of self-annihilation. Ah, those were the days. Spine-shaking drums get straight in the car and take it for a spin in a nightly joyride. They accelerate through the traffic, the red brake lights leaving behind a teary, crimson blur the colour of violence and adrenaline.
Aphex Twin’s “Syro” has already made it a season to remember when it comes to electronic music. “Post Content” takes the more accessible route with its driving rhythms and shocking synths. The steady, continuous pounding of the beat recalls the punishing techno and hard EDM sound that was so prevalent in the years before and after the millennium. The tracks mesmerise and melt with their vivid rainbow colours and their fiery heat. Drum machines kick off the combat, and from here on out there’s no let-up. Beppu’s music is a relentless monster that wants to hunt you down and devour you.
When drum ‘n’ bass disappeared, it was only in hiding, resting. Yes, its time was up, but it morphed and took on a new life – one that was built for speed. Its new mask only just disguised its frenetic youth, but the rhythmic breaks and the breakneck speed couldn’t lay low forever. “Post Content” lusts for the beat. The steady hammering is the rumble of a demolition, where black clouds of dirty smoke rise up from the hi-hats and the snares. The synths have a little vicious side to them, as if they were an unseemly character from the Grand Theft Auto series. They can fatally injure with their fanged blades; this is the dark side of the nightclub.
‘Estimated Pain Scale’ takes the noise up a level. The chunky beats are still there, but a thick membrane of synth oozes through the track. You can ruin a great electronic track with too much variation — luckily, “Post Content” is focused on raw energy and unabashed thrills, going back to a time when the power of the beat was king, and its ceaseless repetition was all that mattered. It’s what we all love about techno in one blistering package — non-stop 4/4.
Laser-bright synths bleed into the high toxicity of the static, oozing into the gutters (but there aren’t any teenage mutant ninja turtles in sight). The energy never drops, and while the synth always seem close to dissolving, its vicious growl keeps it tangled up in its own barbed wire of heaving distortion. Frenetic and wildly ecstatic, “Post Content” is stuck in a rave from the 90’s… and that’s no bad thing. Not much is known about Beppu, apart from the fact that he recorded “Post Content” in one take, in one jam session. That’s impressive. This is the sound of your Saturday night.