[AnD]

Mancunian duo AnD have quickly become a cult name in techno circles, delivering solid, purist-leaning, and on occasion downright brutal 12″s with increasing regularity over the past couple of years. Following a slick 2011 Idle Hands release with much rougher fare on Horizontal Ground, Black Sun, and Hidden Hawaii, here they ably continue the more violent end of their trajectory with this bestial swine of a slab. Indeed, this pair of belting DJ tools — the debut release on their eponymous, limited-run label — ooze distortion, decadence, and barely contained malevolence.

AnD, “001” / “0101” (excerpts)

“001” carries itself with something of the night, featuring a set of distressing top-end samples — a “Psycho”-esque violin stab sweatily rubbing up against unpleasant white noise. The kicks come in distorted, pounding, and tribal form. Very hard, very nasty warehouse techno that wouldn’t have sounded at all out of place at Surgeon’s notoriously debauched Birmingham sweat-fest, House of God, circa 1998, albeit imbued with the producers’ trademark swing. “0101,” by proxy, sounds a little like a long lost Oliver Ho side. Its frenetic synth leads act as hypnotic barrier against the sheer weight of rhythmic pressure. It is to AnD’s credit that they manage to mollify what could have been an unpleasantly harsh track by adding interesting beat syncopations that keep things rolling just when its all getting too much. AnD have delivered a 12″ that (hand) stamps their virtuoso rhythmic quirk over workmanlike old-school British techno. And while the naysayer may — not unreasonably — ask how many more limited vinyl run imprints the scene can realistically sustain, this record ably adds to the growing canon of searingly rough, modern analog techno.