Acre - Hollow Body (2018)

Acre presents a new digestion of technologically advanced cyber-grime on the ‘Hollow Body’ album, a ten track answer to the age old question “when will the robot kill me?”.

Earlier music on Tectonic, Codes and Brainmath has solidified Acre’s music as a station of forward-thinking bass music for todays dystopic street. This issue though Opal Tapes, takes the trans-humanist art of Stelarc, the rattling of kinetic sculptures and reductions of the grime sound palette into new direction entirely. Collectively ‘Hollow Body’ is both a warmer and more fleshed out face to Acre’s work while also taking the statuesque sound design and bone shaking bass of his productions into new spaces.

Opening track ‘Trial 6’ degenerates into error and computer pollution before huge sheets of brightly resonating plastic synth sail off like Steve Roach playing the most ambient of Eski-beat in some unknown void. Signatures of error and failed translation continue in ‘Android’, a signal sent to re-awaken an earlier version of your metal self. ‘Suicide Drone’ plays with sample-rate in a kaleidoscope of broken glass and blasts a part-gabber, part-industrial jack hammer into your head. ‘Glow’ and ‘Direct Registering’ close out the first side with a Chain Reaction-esque procession of flickering zero points, stubbed out chords and fluttering visions recalling the plastic bins behind the call centre.

Something beings to unspool as b-side opens with ‘Hollow Body’, sub-wobbles under lay a stumbling loop of disembodied voice. Guns are out for ‘DNT’ as the metal body which was earlier awoken, dresses and arms itself. All the forward momentum of bass music is inverted into a lumbering swagger replete with cyborg horn. ‘Taking Over’ offers a soft relief of aliasing tones clashing into each other like fucking modems before ‘Second Escape’ stokes the fire once again in an obliterating crush of noise percussions and jewel like synths. Closing track ‘External’ is the desert, the dust of the universe. After the earlier crush everything has to settle and fall back down.