- UK producer Shifted has rapidly—and deservedly—become one of the most prominent names in all-black-everything techno. His stellar 2012 debut album, Crossed Paths, drowned his subterranean thunder in cinematic atmospheres, but he returns to Mote-Evolver with a 12-inch of brutal club tracks.
The first track is called "Razors," though "Barbed Wire" might be a more appropriate title. The signature leaden thump is there, but the surface is wrapped in serrated distortion—like Vatican Shadow's noise-techno explorations in a more functional form. Even more weighty, "Over" sits on a bed of nails instead of throwing them at us. As the woodblocks wade and chords struggle, it possesses the same overwhelming scale that makes the rest of Shifted's techno so powerful. On "Bloodless," he even gets a little funky, swinging the beat and laying down a chord that sounds like a tightly-strung rhythm guitar (if you use your imagination). "Trouble" is core Shifted: prickly sounds probing through the abyss.
Tracklist A1 Razors
A2 Over
B1 Bloodless
B2 Trouble