- Sculpture's last two releases, Toad Blinker and Rotary Signal Emitter, were notable for their dissociative techno detritus as much as for their visual component. The records are "zoetropic picture discs designed to be filmed at 25fps with a high shutter speed," i.e. they're imprinted with animations that change along with the music. Slime Code, the duo's debut for patten's Kaleidoscope label, also challenges the boundaries of physical release formats, though it may be slightly tricky getting a chance to experience it.
Basically, Dan Hayhurst and Reuben Sutherland jammed out the record's contents, and then Hayhurst made seven unique dubs to C20, which Kaleidoscope are selling. The proposition of such a ridiculously limited release will surely elicit eye rolls, but there is something to be said for preserving the work in its original form, especially for music that's alive with such a molten intensity. And thankfully, Kaleidoscope are offering a full-length edit culled from the seven tapes as a free download.
In contrast to their older work—and maybe because it's four long compositions rather than a bunch of short ones—Slime Code feels especially formless, like Sculpture are struggling to keep an infinite array of sounds under control. This imprecision is precisely what makes the record so interesting—the spontaneous moments of coalescence stand in stark relief to its blistering undercurrent of machine debris, found sound and blurred samples.
The first part builds on an interweaving of arpeggiated blips and a loose, tropical rhythm, which gradually get broken up by a seething mass of noise mutations. This is essentially how the other three movements unfold as well—the duo's sputtering, tumbling rhythms either consume or are consumed by Keith Fullerton Whitman-style synthesizer tumult. In the third movement, the stuttering, pulsing techno that appears three minutes in dissolves into a submerged, resigned organ melody, before that too is smothered by a gust of blips. And the fourth is like a soundclash between spare, stunted drums and a carnival-esque, rambunctious cacophony, with each side trying to outdo the other. Although patten's own material is a close analogue, the LP is a considerably more difficult listen, though no less enthralling. Many recent techno-noise crossovers have threatened to fall apart at the seams, but Slime Code actually does, and many times over.