AnD - Psychoanalysis Shapes

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  • Industrial techno is routinely described as "dark," "pounding," "abrasive." Those adjectives could easily apply to AnD, but the duo see their '90s-inspired machine noise differently, describing it as "transcendental." (Indeed, 2014 EP Kundalini referenced yoga.) Similarly, La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela's New York-based Dream House invites visitors to meditate to the needling modular oscillations inside. The agitated techno of AnD's Psychoanalysis Shapes may gesture towards that kind of psychoacoustic trance, but its method is completely different. It's hard to imagine "Detonate" as an introspective moment—its speed and ferocity breach gabber's boundaries. But if your focus shifts from the scarred surfaces to the viscous rhythms, the track takes on a surprising lightness. That's mostly down to AnD's sloshing grooves, contained by rail-straight drums and a boiling arpeggio. The rest of Psychoanalysis Shapes refurbishes the mechanistic grind of 2014's Cosmic Microwave Background LP. The Surgeon-evoking "Fierce" extends the thread of "Cosmic Strings," and both B-side tracks elaborate on the album's flayed surfaces and prickly ambient passages. The distorted kick on "Illusions" seems best suited for pounding meat in an abattoir, but AnD have a talent for creating mesmeric rhythms with ugly sounds. That track's circuit board spasms cycle through glitchy loops, as if grappling with broken computer code, until a disfigured pattern emerges. "Where Are You Going To Take Me," a low-voltage dribble of welding sparks and vibrating metal, evokes a workshop where AnD deconstruct their drum machines. Whatever moving parts remain emit something between a nervous twitch and a murmur, like a robot being stirred from sleep.
  • Tracklist
      A1 Fierce A2 Detonate B1 Illusions B2 Where Are You Going To Take Me
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