That's Harakari

Milwaukee, Wisconsin native Peter Runge debuted as Sd Laika in 2012 with Unknown Vectors, an EP released on the Visionist's Lost Codes label. Alternately (and sometimes simultaneously) bleak and comical, the tracks sounded like grime manglings with a carefree maverick approach akin to that of Actress. And then there was...nothing -- not until the Tri Angle label got in touch and had Runge cough up an album's worth of material that dates from the same period of creativity that birthed the EP. Though Runge's work has been classified "new grime" -- there are, after all, stuttering bits of percussion and Wiley-like blips and clanks mottled across the tracks -- ramshackle techno and U.K. funky are detectable as well. The stuff would be far more effective at moving bodies off -- not on -- a dancefloor. It's more like a soundtrack to the dodging of metallic projectiles or the evasion of rolling armored vehicles. As one might be able to discern from the album's cover alone, Runge is a bit of a joker, and these tracks amuse and torment in roughly equal measure. ~ Andy Kellman|