A new stream of foetidly-brilliant air billows up from the Rotters basement with a new pair of radioactive y-fronts dancing on the radiators: engineer Steve Boardman has set up the Boardroom Studio within the RGC complex and magnetised a motley gang of collaborators spearheaded by Andrew Weatherall, as if he hasn’t caused enough damage this year with several stellar ejaculations [with his own album currently gestating in the sonic sperm banks]. Here you get eight tracks, which in the days of vinyl would qualify for album status. I’m sticking it here anyway as it’s too big; the pouch in its turbo-keks too bulging and the electronic stiffie too fearsome to be risked in among the humble, defenceless singles. For instance first track ‘Spread The Hot Potato’ comes courtesy of veteran nut-job Rad rice who makes a welcome return to these columns under the Radical Majik banner with a dense, atmospheric dronescape lashed with guitars and the old acid melting over the hippo’s bell-end effect. Then it’s Sidney Le Sarge as Le Sarge En Board with the spooked avant-house of ‘Thru The Robot Chicken Shed’ [my favourite track title of the year], James Moss as E.S.C. with electrified fence synth pulsings and Mr Boardman working with Mr Weatherall to adjust the elastic on Rad’s track with dense, dubbed-out guitars which morph into a spellbinding Link Wray hallucination by the end. The pair also manhandle ‘Thru The Chicken Robot Shed’with huge, throbbing dub bassline, spaghetti western guitar sweeps and the kind of unnerving, subterranean atmosphere in which Andrew is still unequalled. Not content with those, he also steams into ‘The Legacy’, again using basic guitar-bass-drum ingredients to make a decaying Alphabet City tenement wobble. Finally a pair of Two Lone Swordsmen tracks – ‘Patient Saints’ and ‘Shack 54’ – remixed respectively by Dave Congreve and E.S.C. to groin-strafing, cranium-scything effect. Just what the doctor ordered, this is lethal, steaming and absolutely recommended. It’s a new style.
5 Out Of 5
Reviewed By: Kris Needs
