[Historia Y Violencia]

The second installment from the vital Historia Y Violencia label tracks two further impeccable emissions from Messrs Mendez and Salazar. For “La Noche,” Silent Servant again digs deep into the vault of Basic Channel rhythms, weighing in with a concrete textured, knuckle scraping journey through some very gritty terrain. Obviously Silent Servant’s Sandwell District camp buddies have been rubbing off on him; the punishing, cruel as winter tones matched with luckless, dead end chords sounding every bit as menacing as an early Downwards release. While there is an ascendant trajectory propelling the chords, their path is narrow and ultimately circuitous, destined to travel the same bleak pathways time and again.

Santiago Salazar’s first side for the label was a much darker affair than we’d expect from him, and though “La Minora” displays a similar coarseness, there is an underlying beauty that wells up to steer the track in a different direction. Salazar’s Detroit tenure brings forth a distinct strain of hi-tech soul to the track, so while the shakers are coated with a thick layer of static film and the synths are bristling with a prickly heat, the melody emerging from all this fuzz is clean and pure. It winds it’s way up through the octaves, snaking around before diving back deep into the silence. Perfectly executed turns from both producers who in the space of two short releases are making their Historia Y Violencia label an absolutely indispensable faction of techno.