Death Mask

Early in their career, Death in Vegas were a successful alternative dance/electronica crossover act who embraced neo-psychedelia and shoegaze, reaching the upper regions of the U.K. charts through collaborations with Iggy Pop and Liam Gallagher. Following 2002s Scorpio Rising, however, they took their music back underground, establishing the label Drone and releasing the Krautrock-indebted Satans Circus. Their subsequent recordings have drifted further from rock music, with 2016s underrated Transmission (featuring former porn star Sasha Grey) brilliantly channeling post-industrial darkwave club music in the vein of Chris & Cosey. Since then, Richard Fearless (DIVs sole constant member) released a pair of solo albums, Deep Rave Memory being driving analog techno and Future Rave Memory a haunting dark ambient work. Death Mask sounds closer in spirit to those two records than anything previously released under the name Death in Vegas, melding noise, drone, and industrial influences with the type of pure, unrelenting warehouse techno associated with Birmingham and Berlin. Two tracks, "Chingola" and "Roisin Dub(h)," consist entirely of grainy, distant drones and shadowy, rippling synths. The remainder of the tracks are all beat-driven, drastically varying in tempo and often featuring detailed, unconventional rhythmic patterns. "Lovers" starts out with harsh, blaring noise before setting off on a high-speed chase, soon switching from manic oscillations to a textural sound bath. The slower, more spaced-out "While My Machines Gently Weep" brings to mind the trippy, shoegaze-influenced techno of Daniel Avery, while others are closer to the stark, dub-informed tracks by Surgeon and the Sandwell District collective. "Roseville" is percolating electro-techno with snapping beats, and "Hazel" is akin to a bullet-train head rush. "Your Love," most certainly inspired by Jamie Principles Chicago house classic of the same name, is steadier and more sensual, while "Death Mask" draws from the progressive, spacy sounds of Detroit techno. Fearless has taken the Death in Vegas project in numerous seemingly unrelated directions over the years, and few who have been following him since the big beat era could have predicted him making noisy, uncompromising techno influenced by Terrence Dixon and Pan Sonic. ~ Paul Simpson