Over nine tracks and 40 minutes, Minimal Violence figured out how to make extroverted techno sound downright brainy. Although the duo of Ashlee Lúk and Lida Pawliuk throw down waves of throbbing bass, stuttering drum machines and strobe-lit rhythms, there seems to be a real sonic craft and subtlety behind their debut LP, InDreams.
The Vancouver duo's colliding/collapsing blend of beefy electro, brash punk rock and insular industrial may come from the way these tracks were conceived; written as a live on-stage set and then recorded in a traditional studio, leaving tracks like the "Windowlicker"-meets-"Axel F" run-through of "New Hard Catch" and the chromatic four-on-the-floor banger "Virus Prophecy" seem simultaneously adventurous and familiar.
But no matter how many sounds and rhymical avenues Minimal Violence explore, it's the raw, brooding, unrelenting energy found on tracks like the vocal-sampling "Persuasive Behaviour" and the fist-pumping stadium anthem "InDreams" that makes this album so nakedly and unapologetically fulfilling. Minimal Violence's debut LP may be a throwback album for those who remember the golden age of techno — but if you remember the golden age of techno, you don't need a review to sell you on the power of InDreams.
(Technicolour)The Vancouver duo's colliding/collapsing blend of beefy electro, brash punk rock and insular industrial may come from the way these tracks were conceived; written as a live on-stage set and then recorded in a traditional studio, leaving tracks like the "Windowlicker"-meets-"Axel F" run-through of "New Hard Catch" and the chromatic four-on-the-floor banger "Virus Prophecy" seem simultaneously adventurous and familiar.
But no matter how many sounds and rhymical avenues Minimal Violence explore, it's the raw, brooding, unrelenting energy found on tracks like the vocal-sampling "Persuasive Behaviour" and the fist-pumping stadium anthem "InDreams" that makes this album so nakedly and unapologetically fulfilling. Minimal Violence's debut LP may be a throwback album for those who remember the golden age of techno — but if you remember the golden age of techno, you don't need a review to sell you on the power of InDreams.
