Salaryman @ The Sausage Machine, Hope and Anchor, Islington
Des Lynam's face peers through a storm of static fog as the gentle
hand of RGM coaxes the tuner on the flickering TV set to the side of
her sonic laboratory equipment. She never gets the full picture
though, and neither do we, Salaryman remaining mysterious throughout
this intense set of droning, bleeping and eardrum-buzzing bass held
together by supremely tight beats. Obvious reference points are
Fridge and Stereolab, the experimental end of the post-rock crowd, but
with all pretence of East-European cool rejected and a dollop of Funk
slapped in its place. The venue is a sweatbox tonight, packed solid
and no air-conditioning, but no-one's leaving, the atmosphere is
charged giving the songs from the eponymous LP (reviewed elsewhere) a
new sense of THRILL, most clearly seen on the re-worked "New
Centurions" with its helicopter rotor-blade samples twisting in and
out of the beat and the groove seeming to go on forever.
Read the rest of Robots & Electronic Brains
Get your own Free Homepage