Demdike Stare - Tryptich

here's the boys reviews for the 3 albums all on one page!

...according to our Ant on 22 April 2010.

This is the dual work of Sean Canty who is involved in the Finders Keepers label and fellow Manchester cohort Miles Whittaker (MLZ/Pendle Coven). The LP is comprised of two parts: Dusk and Dawn. This is very good indeed... It's sort of dark occult ceremony/ ritual soundtrack music, doomy and heavy. It builds slowly with sinister sub bass and strings and some spacey dub techno effects and keys no doubt the work of Miles. The transition between styles is super slick and before you realise it you're in different sonic territory. Then there are shades of dark ambient and almost jazzy flourishes. Both sides are doing it for me but I reckon Dusk is probably my preference. Towards the end of 'Dawn' the track breaks down into a sort of Caretaker sounding hauntalogical sound complete with almost dub-steppy bass. Nice ouija board artwork by Andy Votel.

...according to our Brian on 29 July 2010.

Loving this new DS material. They've certainly developed a pretty original sound template. Infusing abstracted ambient vibes, zen-like percussion, progressive dub/minimal techno & the atmospheric weight of dubstep with the sinister, apocalyptic menace of Sean Canty's vast sound-sample / vinyl archive, this duo, (the other member being Lancashire's respected beat scientist Miles Whittaker) have hit on a darkly spiritual recipe. This new album (the 2nd in a series of three) opens with a brooding journey into stripped-down cinematic dub - totally mesmerising! - before entering the realms of industrial drone - plates of grainy noise shifting rhythmically over a calming cosmic synth! Finishing the side off is a slice of experimental dubby techno, saturated in eerie atmospherics & explicit glitch & crackle. Onto side 2 and the unsettling dark ambience of the 'The Stars Are Moving'. This leads us on to 'Eurydice', which possesses a snaky Eastern themed percussive mantra feel, recalling Dusk + Blackdown & Shackleton's sparse tribalisms - really spine-tingling & eerie stuff! To bookend this tune, another fine excercise in meditative 'n' pulsating dark ambience called 'Regolith'. Bring on Round 3, this is scintillating gear indeed!!

...according to our Brian on 25 November 2010.

That man has escaped his Pendle Coven again and has recently been spotted skulking around the sinister backwaters of Lancashire with his erstwhile partner-in-crime - the one who actually finds lots of amazing records in junk shops whereas everyone else finds Jim Diamonds's Greatest Hits & a knackered copy of the best of Dionne Warwick. Yes Demdike Stare unleash the final installment of their uniformly excellent 2010 album series. This track - 'Hashshashin Chant' - that eventually crawls out of the sonic murk (after a somewhat eerie introduction) is quite something. They call it bellydance disco, I call it Shackleton gobbling an old Diplo baltimore/kuduro platter and regurgitating it back up in the form of a malevolent Eastern chant/dub-snake of a thing. Tribal-as-fuck, with a distinct unsettling edge. It makes me think of the aural equivalent of a Chinese dragon populated by scores of shady faceless spies on creepy drugs, the whole carnival feel stunted by paranoia. It is a totally flooring piece of understated soundsystem ammunition. Things go more minimal with the slowly evolving 'Repository of Light' which marries woozy drone, dark ambient & eventually submerged dub techno that gives way to some class pulsing kosmische visions. Side two brings back the blackened magic, blending ambient-noir with dubby jitters & sinister intentions. Further brief exploration (I'll save the full immersion for home, thanks) sees further entwining of murky bass with all manner of disorientating, foreboding samples & effects. Clanking, funereal dirges and some pitch-black ghostly drones. Well dystopian. It all culminates in a very eerie bad place indeed. I think the boys may have found their way back to the coven, except they may now have some surprise company. Brrrrr, I feel soiled, but in a really good way....