We Have a Technical 563: Khan and Hammer

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Sixth June

Sixth June

We’re catching up with a whole slew of news and live show business off the top of this episode as your regularly scheduled ID:UD programming resumes, and we’re returning to the ever-popular Pick Five format. From powernoise to goth rock we’re each picking some especially long tracks and talking about how that length has shaped our impressions of them. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Pixel Grip, “Percepticide: The Death of Reality”

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Pixel Grip
Percepticide: The Death of Reality
self-released

It’s been a little over four years since Pixel Grip’s breakthrough sophomore album Arena was released, a perfect record for that exact moment in time. The Chicago based-trio’s genre-bending mix of EBM, darkwave, and club music, all served with audacious confidence was the ideal soundtrack for a world just emerging from pandemic restrictions and returning to dancefloors en masse. The lengthy wait for a follow-up record and the band’s growing rep as a live act, mean that 2025’s Percepticide: The Death of Reality has some significant expectations attached to it on arrival.

Perhaps as an acknowledgement of, or in direct defiance of those expectations, the record opens with a track that couldn’t be more different from the buzzing, acerbic posture of Pixel Grip’s signature hits “ALPHAPUSSY” or “Demon Chaser”. Where those songs got over on the basis of attitude and whipsmart rhythm programming, “Crow’s Feast” is a soft, reflective cut that finds vocalist Rita Lukea at her most open, likening heartache and disappointment to being eaten alive, while a tasteful and minimal arrangement of synths plays out behind her. It’s hard not to see it as something of a power move and a statement of purpose in one; we already knew that Lukea and bandmates Tyler Ommen and Jonathon Freund can heat up dancefloors, but opening with an exploration of the emotions behind their sexually-empowered anthems changes up the context for the album significantly. Hence why the already familiar single “I Bet You Do” (originally released in 2023) feels different here, its fuckboy-kiss-off lyrics coloured by the vulnerability that preceded it, but without taking the cutting edge off of its chittering synthlines and snappy drums.

That dichotomy, although not as pronounced in its opening tracks, is at the heart of the record. For every sweaty, bass-forward dancefloor burner like “Stamina” (whose “Daddy come over/Fuck me over and over” hook is as memorable as any PG have ever recorded), there’s a slowburn joint like “Noise” where the band dial it back and rely more on atmospherics and melody as conveyed by ghostly synths and trappy cymbal programming. Most intriguing are the moments where Pixel Grip split the difference between grinding it out and confessional soul-baring; “A Moment With God” is as close to pure synthpunk as the band have ever gotten, its drums and bass guitar rolling along while Lukea flips between a wounded croon and dismissive shout.

Percepticide shows more of Pixel Grip than anticipated, and in ways that fit nicely with the bratty, sexually-liberated, nightlife image they’ve been cultivating up ’til this point. It’s got the bangers you’d expect certainly, supplemented with some emotional sincerity and some of their most developed songwriting to date; a record that explores club life, and the emotional fallout of what happens on and off the dancefloor.

Buy it.

Percepticide: The Death of Reality by Pixel Grip

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Youth Code, “Yours, With Malice”

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Youth Code - Yours, With Malice

Youth Code
Yours, With Malice
Sumerian Records

Even leaving the general state of the world at large at the door, dark music has undergone a couple of sea changes since the last time we had a proper stand-alone release from LA industrial dynamos Youth Code. Since 2015’s Commitment To Complications Berlin-styled TBM and pop/dancefloor focused darkwave have taken up a massive amount of oxygen in clubs and online (this site included), pushing the sort of abrasive hybrid of EBM and electro-industrial which has always been Youth Code’s sound back to the margins. Perhaps their 2021 collaboration with post-hardcore noise merchant King Yosef makes even more sense in that light, as do their tours with the likes of Code Orange – crowds hardwired for punk and metal are more likely to be on Sara Taylor and Ryan George’s wavelength than those drawn in by Mareaux or Boy Harsher.

Regardless of the recent past, Youth Code’s new EP Yours, With Malice is exactly the sort of reintroduction the broader industrial world needs to Youth Code and the sort of distillation of their strengths long-term fans would hope for. The stuttering, stabbing bass which falls in and out of sync with the drums of opener “No Consequence” is classic Youth Code going right back to their demo days, and “Wishing Well” (not a Terrence Trent D’Arby cover, for what it’s worth) gets over via the sort of subtle swing and funk vintage electro-industrial camouflages within its bricolage.

The changes, such as they are, that Yours, With Malice shows are generally minor production and arrangement tweaks which bring all of the density you’d expect in Youth Code’s most cacophonic and dense tracks into clarity. The whiplash shifts between glitchy beats and more propulsive and straightforward kicks on “In Search Of Tomorrow” feels seamless, and the details in the distorted textures of “Wishing Well” (and really the entire EP) feel more clearly parsable than they might have in the past without sacrificing grit. That consideration’s carried over thematically, too, with “Make Sense” knowing when to have the shuddering drums to drop out and leave the icy disaffection of the programming to match Taylor’s exhausted desperation, or in how the slightly less aggressive, dark electro styled synths which emerge in the second half of closer “I’m Sorry” underscore Taylor seeming to aim her vitriol inward in the EP’s final minutes.

Youth Code’s arrival in 2013 crystalized a sense of dissatisfaction with stale North American legacy acts and the diminishing returns of a club and remix-focused European ecosystem and heralded a new wave of rough and uncompromising EBM and industrial. While the landscape of 2025 is quite different, Yours, With Malice feels like an equally welcome disruption. Times change, Youth Code don’t, and thank fuck for that. Recommended.

Buy it.

Yours, With Malice by Youth Code

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Tracks: June 16th, 2025

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Tributes to and thoughts about Douglas McCarthy continue to pour out in the wake of the legendary Nitzer Ebb frontman’s passing. In particular, if you haven’t already done so we’d suggest taking a look at friend of the site Ned Ragget‘s thoughts as well as a very informative Quietus pieces looking at the role McCarthy’s upbringing in Essex played in Ebb’s early days. If you’re like us, you’ve been listening to a lot of Ebb and the other music Douglas had a hand in over the past few days; we hope it’s provided you the same comfort and energy it’s always given us.

Black Magnet

Black Magnet rolling their way into the semis.

Seeming, “Grindshow”
We are unabashed fans of Alex Reed’s Seeming; since we first heard “The Burial” the post-everything (thematically and musically) project has been close to our hearts, and a salve in uncertain times. So a new Seeming single obviously comes with a lot of expectations for us, so when we say “Grindshow” is unexpected, please understand we mean that in the best possible way: that chopped sample, that funky guitar lick, Alex half-singing, half-speaking in bizarre rhythmic cadence, that wild brass-infused climax, we couldn’t have expected any of it, and we love it.
Grindshow by Seeming

Rotersand, “Private Firmament (I Fell For You)”
Hey, there’s a new Rotersand LP coming this Summer, and we’re very interested by what we’re hearing in debut taste “Private Firmament (I Fell For You)”. The German trio have always had a pleasing way of threading the needle between European electro, synthpop and EBM, and on this single they even bring in some big beat and techno sounds to the table, making it club-worthy and musically interesting. Definitely more focused on rhythm than melody (check that funky clip-clop percussion on the outro), it’ll be real interesting to hear what the rest of the record has to offer come August.
Don't Become The Thing You Hated by Rotersand

Hypnoskull, “Underqualified Enemies”
As was detailed on this site in an analysis of Hypnoskull’s 2019 Maschinenfest performance, there can be a surprising amount of conceptual depth beneath the surface of the veteran Belgian producer’s brand of powernoise. New EP Ich Nicht is no exception, digging not just into the current horrific state of things but the hurdles and inertia those trying to fight against it are often hampered by, as well as the general shoddiness of the supervillains currently fucking our collective shit up in the case of this track. Icy and simultaneously disciplined and utterly chaotic in its rhythms, it’s just what you’d hope for out of Hypnoskull.
Ich Nicht by Hypnoskull

INVA//ID, “Messiah”
Los Angeles’ INVA//ID has been making some good moves in 2025: the release of the dark-electro project led by Christopher Rivera’s LP The Agony Index has been supported by a steady stream of singles, remixes and b-sides, brings us to “Messiah”. Included on the digital single for “Sinner”, it’s a collab between Rivera and industrial metal flamekeepers Black Magnet’s James Hammontree that splits the difference between their sounds and delivers a roiling, crushing heater of a track that recalls Ministry’s “You Know What You Are?” and Pitchshifter circa Industrial. Do a whole album of this and we wouldn’t be mad at all.
Sinner by INVA//ID

Black Magnet, “Better Than Love”
Hey, speaking of Black Magnet the Oklahoma-based outfit has their third salvo of grinding industrial metal on deck. While the cover design of Megamantra and first teaser “Endless” underline the debt the band owes to Godflesh, this new track is something altogether different. Bringing some seriously cocky strut and swagger to industrial metal chugging, it gets the sort of personality Black Magnet have been able to conjure at will right out front in stark contrast to so many of the turgid industrial metal acts still roaming the wastes who can’t shred half as hard as this to boot.
Megamantra by Black Magnet

Zack Zack Zack, “Duvar”
The first new original material we’ve had in a couple of years from Viennese duo Zack Zack Zack has one foot in the steady rockin’ mix of EBM-touched darkwave they’ve been trading in since the beginning, but this number eschews the cool, sultry grooves we normally associate with ZZZ for a much more frenetic and claustrophobic palette which perhaps brings the little hint of Neue Deutsche Welle in their style to the fore with clattering abandon.
Duvar by Zack Zack Zack

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Gallows’ Eve, “For The Black Birds”

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Gallows' Eve - For The Black Birds

Gallows’ Eve
For The Black Birds
M&A Musicart

By the time their first LP, a compilation of existing singles and new material, was released Swedish trio Gallows’ Eve had their particular read on goth on lock. Stormy, anthemic, and decidedly rock, 13 Thorns was as tight and strong a debut as a band could hope for. Follow up record For The Black Birds arrives a little over a year later and doesn’t deviate from the formula it’s predecessor set forth, apart from perhaps blending its different components into a more unified and regulated sound.

Gallows’ Eve’s sturm und drang style lifts from the long tradition of continental, metal-adjacent goth rock, but is much more flexible and, frankly, memorable and hooky than nearly all of the gloom merchants in that vein one might name dating back to the Nephilim. Tunes like “The Damage”, with its seething and measured verses building to a wind-whipped half-time chorus adorned with squalling leads and Andreas Lundberg’s wounded bellow exemplify how much movement and drama Gallows’ Eve can pack into tight four-minute structures. Even when they tilt a bit more towards the Leeds style of goth on opener “Ars Corax” or straight-up butt rock on “We Chase The Dark”, the well-blended instrumentation and slick production leaves no doubt about who’s playing.

Much of the above could certainly be taken as an accurate accounting of 13 Thorns, and really it’s the fact that most of the nine tracks here contain a little bit of each of those core elements, rather than casting out into more specifically thrashing or chamber-goth directions, which distinguishes For The Black Birds from it. The epic (read: slow) balladeering of closer “The Hunger” and “Let The Storm In”, with its lithe synth-string focus, are perhaps the tracks lying the farthest afield from that core sound. Hell, even the degree to which the album’s titular corvids are repeatedly mentioned in the lyrics makes for a consistent thread. Thankfully, a fairly tight run-time and the band’s already established talent for immediate hooks keeps that sense of unity from ever feeling homogenous.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” isn’t exactly the most compelling pitch for a record, but it’s a strategy that works for Gallows’ Eve. The audience drawn to them by their previous work was likely drawn in by their talent for a style which simply isn’t executed well very often these days, and are likely hoping they keep the hot hand going. Luckily for them, For The Black Birds sits ably beside its predecessor and helps to clarify both Gallows’ Eve’s style and their place as one of the strongest trad goth bands going today. Recommended.

Buy it.

For The Black Birds by Gallows' Eve

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We Have a Technical 562: To The Left

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Douglas McCarthy

The passing of legendary Nitzer Ebb frontman Douglas J. McCarthy is the only thing we could talk about on this week’s podcast. Forgive us if this episode is a bit more scattered than usual; news of McCarthy’s passing came out less than an hour before our recording, but we wanted to at least get some of our thoughts about his work and legacy out, as well as personal remembrances. As always, you can rate and subscribe on iTunes, download directly, or listen through the widget down below.

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Lead Into Gold, “Knife the Ally”

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Lead Into Gold
Knife The Ally
Artoffact Records

Knife the Ally is Lead Into Gold’s third album since Paul Barker reactivated the project, and seems to be a culmination of the celebrated producer and bassist’s approach to music in this millennium. Where 2018’s The Sun Behind The Sun referred back to the classic Wax Trax sound that Barker helped define with his work as a producer and member of Ministry during that band’s imperial period, and 2023’s The Eternal Present looked forward into an abstracted version of industrial rock, 2025’s Knife The Ally finds the mid-point between its predecessors; it’s a record that features both clamorous programmed percussion and deep bass rhythms, but departs from standard industrial rock song structures in intriguing fashion.

A track like “Lionize” nicely encapsulates the current ethos of Lead Into Gold; it’s got familiar rolling drums and strategically placed samples of ghostly melodies and noisy squeals, while its bassline and Barker’s weird, keening vocal establish a much chiller and more freeform groove between the spikes of the more aggressive sounds. Elsewhere, the title track opens with a short loop of mechanical noise that becomes the basis for an escalating charge forward, never resolving its movement between verse and chorus, but adding weight with each layer of synths and noise until it all comes to a crashing halt.

Sometimes low-to-the-ground and smooth (the economical industrial dub of “It’s All a Sign”), sometimes strident and forceful (the piston-pumping mid-tempo attack of “From Tomorrow”), Knife the Ally is rarely calm, but conversely rarely chaotic. As with his best classic and modern material, Barker understands the value of centering rhythm and movement in his compositions, never derailing or getting stuck running in circles. Listen to how he turns the lope of closer “Dripping from the Hilt” into a slow motion swirl of textures, half-waltz, half atonal avant-garde modular synth workout, all joined via a simple assembly of drums and bass. Alternately, the abrasive “We Can Be Paralyzed” is all rusted out cymbals and distorted synthlines but stays in a pocket with root-note bass and simple kick-snares. There’s always a lot going on sonically, but the economy of the track times helps it all stay on course; at less than a half-hour in length, no song on the record has time to exhaust itself, or the listener.

Knife the Ally is a record that splits the difference between Barker’s work as a technician and as an artist, and nicely highlights his proficiency in both. While not strictly improvisational and never loose structurally, it does have an almost jazz-like experimentalism in its heart: it’s an exploration of possibilities within established forms that only those who have already mastered their standard shape can undertake. Paul Barker is a musician of that calibre in the world of post-industrial, and this is him showing where he can take the sounds and ideas he helped pioneer.

Buy it.

Knife The Ally by PAUL ION BARKER

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Tracks: June 10th, 2025

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Annnnnd we’re back. With Bruce’s return from his ancestral homeland, and Alex emerging from a sweat induced coma brought on by some unseasonably warm Vancouver weather, the mothership that is www.idieyoudie.com will resume our normal posting schedule after this slightly shortened week. We hope you didn’t miss us too much (we hope you missed us at least a little though), and while we did have plenty of podcasts during the break in written content featuring the likes of Psyched, Bootblacks, and Jason Pettigrew, there’s always something nice about doing the thing that brought us to the dance: writing about new music from the world of Our Thing. And speaking of which, we got a fresh batch of Tracks for your pleasure right below. Enjoy!

Pixel Grip at their most them

Pixel Grip, “Reason to Stay”
Chicago trio Pixel Grip have been on an absolute tear with their recent singles, between the high-key dramatic groove of “I Bet You Do” to the bump-and-ground-to-dust of “Stamina” and the almost sweet uplift of “Split”. Their most recent missive is “Reason to Stay”, a track that finds them exploring both their softer emotional side and their righteous anger in equal measure; the cut starts with a typically funky bassline and vocalist Rita Lukea showing some vulnerability before launching into a cutting attack on someone who pushed her too far. New album has been a long wait, but if the whole lives up to the songs we’ve heard so far, it’s gonna be a burner.
Reason to Stay by Pixel Grip

Rhys Fulber feat. Barkosina, “Only Love Will Save Us”
Rhys Fulber (you don’t need us to run down the man’s credits, you know who he is) has made a real career of doing industrial techno under his own name in recent years, applying much of the programming and sound design that has influenced generations of artists to a genre where he can explore his brutalist tendencies in full. The singles from his Artoffact debut Memory Impulse Autonomy has thus far dipped into some territory that Fulber hasn’t necessarily touched on in his solo productions thus far, finding a nice balance between melodics and vocals and his pounding drums and programming – check out “Only Love Will Save Us”, where the voice of Years of Denials’ Barkosina inhabits an instrumental that is both propulsive and emotive, steadfast and bold without giving up on sincerity and emotion.
Memory Impulse Autonomy by Rhys Fulber

Slighter feat. Craig Huxtable, “Stories to Tell”
The relationship between Slighter’s Colin Cameron and friend of the site Craig Huxtable of Landscape Body Machine and Ohmelectronic goes back for a few years, a case of two artists finding a commonality in philosophy and complimenting one another’s strengths. New single “Stories to Tell” has the detailed production and highly textured ambience that is synonymous with Slighter, while Huxtable’s vocals move further than ever before into emotive, melodic territory. It’s a combination that puts us in mind of Architect, an unexpected but not at all unwelcome territory for these two to explore together.
Stories To Tell (Single) by Slighter x Craig Joseph Huxtable

ESA, “Pound of Flesh”
Maybe it’s weird to use a descriptor for an act as acerbic and aggressive as ESA, but it’s hard to think of a band that has quite the same batting average when it comes to putting out records that consistently deliver, while pushing the project’s envelope. “Pound of Flesh” from the forthcoming Sounds for Your Happiness is pretty much everything we want from an ESA club track; pounding drum programming, Jamie Blacker’s powerful vocals and some deceptively clever arrangement choices that marry the project’s technoid and rhythmic noise roots to modern bass sounds. Play this loud, it’s worth it.
Sounds for your Happiness by ESA

HIDE, “DEEPER THAN DEATH (here on earth) I DESTROY”
Oh shit, HIDE is back, everyone look busy. Jokes aside, we’ve always been fans of the Chicago-based duo, from their earliest more beat oriented material to their current noisy experimentalism, not far off from power electronics but with the cheap shocks replaced with substantial politic and artistic vitriol. “DEEPER THAN DEATH (here on earth) I DESTROY” is pretty much what we’ve come to expect from HIDE, with screeching loops that are neither formless nor arranged in easy sequence, and the excoriating vocals of Heather Hannoura tearing their way through the din. Something to throw if you’re having a good day and want to ruin it a little, or a bad day and need something to scrape off the filth.
DEEPER THAN DEATH (here on earth) I DESTROY by HIDE

SOFT VEIN, “Here Comes the Rain Again”
When we wrote up the most recent album from California depressive post-punk/darkwave act SOFT VEIN, we noted that the project’s bleak outlook was balanced by mild glimmers of hope. The soon to be released EP From Another Room does a fine job building on those glimpses of a brighter light with some remixes from the likes of Twin Tribes and QUAL, and this quite lovely cover of the Eurhythmics “Here Comes the Rain Again”, a fine subject for the project to take on and that matches their melancholic outlook to a tee.
FROM ANOTHER ROOM (EP) by SOFT VEIN

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