Detritus
Endogenous
With his impressive debut,
“Sense/Martyr”, and a split with Antigen Shift on his own Immanence label, Detritus sparked the interest of many a
disillusioned and jaded industrial fan who, tired of endless beats and noise,
craved something more emotional. While
Detritus can dispense beats with alarming ferocity, it is his instrumental side
that really delivers: an infectious blend of warm synthetic tones and
flamboyant orchestral exhortations.
“Endogenous” is his first full-length album, for German label Ad
Noiseam, that truly demonstrates the extent of his compositional wizardry.
Opening with Ramify’s
eddying haze of low cellos and ethereal noise, it then sends us through long
refrains of relaxed, cinematic amalgamations of loose breakbeats and emotive
string lines. Like its title suggests,
the track skips fluidly through different branches and variations on the main
theme, creating a more deeply complex piece than it appears on the
surface. It is in his intricacy that
Detritus really comes into his own, eschewing the trite, sweeping pads that
others use for unadorned emotion and replacing them with tightly woven textures. On pieces such as Restoration and Maxim,
these arrangements are given life through the musical abject – seemingly
trivial falterings in the sampled instruments and small gasps of naturally
sourced reverb that create a perfect fusion of authenticity and artifice and
bring a certain verve to the music.
Behind all this technical
bravado, though, there is still a core of genuine musicianship and ear for
harmony that lends a great deal of power to much of the work on here: Exogenous’ sombre, descending
melodies, Maxim’s heartfelt piano passages and the deep, sawing
underground strings of Enumeration all rest upon intelligent arrangement
and composition for their effectiveness and fundamental strength. Never before has such astute instrumentation
been combined with underground sensibilities and industrial aesthetics; and as
such Detritus truly stands out as an exceptional entity in the current
burgeoning musical climate.
Alongside the trademark tracks
of elegant strings and breaks, there are also a few unexpected turns along the
way, such as the dark ambient and tribal styling of Hollowed that brings
the album’s emotion down to its most despondent state; an utterly chilling
closing track. Moreover, though, there
is the one remnant of Detritus’ collaboration with Pneumatic Detach, Immanent. It is a frighteningly loud, chaotic and
noisy piece that sees a perfect marriage of the skilful breaks and floating
airs of Detritus with Pneumatic Detach’s skewed noise melodies and dank,
industrial atmospheres. His
co-conspirator from this track also provides a remix of Endogenous [from
the “Words, Becoming vol.2” compilation] alongside Scrap.edx’s Immanent mix
that give the album two final bursts of manic, noise-fuelled energy before its
close.
With “Endogenous” Detritus has
proven that there is still uncharted territory in the industrial genre,
bringing a renaissance of traditional, organic music to the digital form and
showing that power can lie in areas besides noise and distortion. One of the most emotive and enrapturing
releases of the year, the album marks a watershed in electronic music as well
as another fine release from Ad Noiseam.
Gavin Lees
21.07.2k3