- Milo Smee doesn't tend to make things easy for himself. His band Chrome Hoof is notorious for its elaborate shows. A recent production under his Binary Chaffinch alias, "Heavenz Gate," was a 20-minute Italo disco homage that made Lindstrom look minimalist in comparison, and that took him two years to make, as he recently told Juno Plus. The first record for his Power Vacuum label, recorded under the new alias Bintus, seems like it was a lot more effortless. According to the same interview, Smee spent three days with a borrowed 303 and an 808, filling up a hard drive in the process.
However "Corrosion Control" came together, it sounds spontaneous, with a gnarled acid line in constant mutation over a no-nonsense drum groove. The slow tempo contributes to its particularly malevolent feel; so does the distortion, which seems less like an effect added on top and more like a substance eating away at the sound from within. "Advanced Fuel" dials up the tempo to a quick electro clip, tearing into a blippy top line and relishing heart-stopping dropouts and aberrant asides. Wearing its fondness for Drexciya and Dopplereffekt on its ragged sleeve, it's not something you could call groundbreaking, but that doesn't make it any less inspired; there's ample, infectious pleasure in every bar.
Tracklist A Corrosion Control
B Advanced Fuel