Sawf - #001

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  • Sawf certainly has a formula, and it's up there with some of the most threatening techno around. But as Matt Unicomb astutely noted in his review of last year's Masif, the music is rarely in a hurry. Often skulking about at some menacing house pace, the Sawf tracks that shine brightest are seismically groovy ones. When matched to looped vocals—as in "Zelo," off 2011 debut album Flaws, Pamfago's "Body" and here in heavyweight opener "Booma"—Sawf's potent trademarks take a turn for the terribly catchy, embodying an even rarer singalong techno gem that, once lodged, can be hard to remove. And "Booma" does just that. It's a prickly, dystopian hip-hop burr, sounding like some updated and synthesised version of what Justin K Broadrick and Kevin Martin might have devised as Techno Animal. The rest of the EP is Sawf taking a more steeled and slamming approach, with "Patimento" and "Kofta" doing the forward-throttle thing he's more than capable of. Still, they pale in comparison to the kind of impact "Booma" makes on that first indelible listen. "Katolistha" reins it all back in for one of the industrial-funky numbers that have made the Greek artists's movements such a treat to follow.
  • Tracklist
      A1 Booma A2 Patimento B1 Katolistha B2 Kofta
RA