- It's strange that in a genre like techno—which strives, more than most, for a stringent economy of means (bordering, at times, on the ascetic)—to call something "tool-like" is mildly derogatory. It's as if to say, "this track is too economical; there's not enough of it!", or some such like. But there's an art to making techno which flirts with miscellany (if that's not too oxymoronic a way of putting it), and a brave producer that chooses to leave out all but the bare necessities. Done effectively, it makes for the purest sort of dance floor gear, and, by proxy, the purest sort of raving. Which—short of solving the mind/body problem, or, even better, ridding the world of imbeciles—is the whole point, right?
Wirmean's "Monobloc" is a prime example: it's almost a tool, insofar as mixed heavily with a fleshier number of a similar tone, it works beautifully. Left bare and exposed, however, it sounds bloody good too, a bleeping, bone-hard 6 AM roller replete with gut-punching kicks and skittering, ice cold hats, but no mid-range whatsoever, like the vulture-knawed skeleton of something once much beefier and all the nastier for it. That Wireman hails from renowned Scottish hell-hole Paisley makes total sense: this is lanky, darkside techno par excellence.
"Distance" is even better, a lumbering, stone carved tech house behemoth that plods along with a morose sort of funk, like Monolake and Claro Intelecto doing valium at a rave in Portable's basement and (somehow) getting a perfect front left stomp on. "To The Sleeper," by comparison, is manic, flapping around like the bastard child of naughties Sheffield and noughties Bristol, all schizoid chords and jittery, shuffling kicks. It's the least cohesive of the three pieces, but also the most exuberant, capping off an unnervingly mature EP in tastefully rambunctious fashion.
Tracklist A1 Monobloc
B1 Distance
B2 To the Sleeper