Weren’t these guys supposed to put out two albums last year? Instead we got an EP filled with recycled cuts from their early vinyl, and we began to wonder if the notion of scary, big-floor electro-acid thumposity was just too good to last. Black Strobe have always purveyed a singular dynamic - like a dance AC/DC. “Last Dub On Earth” doesn’t exactly upset that notion, but it does break up the hegemony of dark, fucked-up beats by giving us something a good deal warmer - though I wouldn’t go so far as to call it human. “Nazi Trance Fuck Off” as remixed by James Holden on the flip clicks back the niceness even further, but it repaints the Strobe in psychedelic hues potent enough to be worthy of a potential flashback. Is there such a thing as Nazi Trance? Is it a Dead Kennedys cover? The answers to these questions could quite possibly drive you insane. So, too, might this schizoid cauldron of bubbling analog bleeps and hallucinogenic echoes, the sonic equivalent of being chased down blind alleys by PCP-wielding French lunatics with an Orb fixation, bent on raping your mind with their delirious near-ambient noodlings. Shiversomely delightful.

Crosstown Rebels / 027
[Mallory O’Donnell]