Schwarzbund

There’s a long and rich heritage of electronic music - not to mention music with a leaning toward the darker side - emerging from Germany. KRAFTWEK may have kick-started it all, but with the likes of DAF and EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN, not to mention the gloriously angular X-MAL DEUTSCHLAND and techno-industrial warriors KMFDM, there’s been a steady stream of exciting truly groundbreaking acts who’ve broken out of their domestic scene and exerted a substantial influence much further afield. SCHWARZBUND may not break much new ground on ‘Von der Suche’, but definitely belong to this lineage. Mining a seam of dark synth music propelled by industrial dance beats, they do sit toward the poppier end of the electro spectrum, but make no mistake, there’s no shortage of weight or atmosphere here, with René’s baritone vocal, coupled with his strong Germanic inflection providing a definite focal point. ‘Kalte Zeit’ kicks the album off and begins with a blast of noise and crackling distortion, before a metronomic dance beat drives through. Ice-cold synths see-saw over an industrial Eurobeat and there’s a distinctly gothic feel to the track. It sets the tone for the album as a whole: pulsating electro with a brooding Darkwave slant that often sits somewhere between SUSPIRIA and MUSSOLINI HEADKICK and owing a clear debt to ‘Pretty Hate Machine’ era NINE INCH NAILS. ‘Warm’ has a softer edge and a hint of DEPECHE MODE about it. It’s something of a standout track, not least of all on account of its directness and accessibility. There’s something of a mid-album slump with a brace of slower songs - ‘Deine Kälte’ and ‘Engel Hinter Gittern’ - reducing the momentum and struggling to hold the attention. They recover things with the pulsating mechanoid ‘Seelensuche’, and hard dance and industrial fuse together on the hypnotic ‘Lebeslicht’. The switch to English language for ‘Receding Angels’ seems a little incongruous, but the lyrics manage to avoid the translational awkwardness that can so often arise. Closer ‘Weg des Lebens’ could justly be described as a slow-burning epic, the drums kept at a respectful distance while brooding string sounds drift atop a sturdy bass line. It’s a fitting conclusion to a solid album, on which the pop aspect is at least equalled by the dark.