MOTHBOY

Take ‘Second Spin r.i.p’ for example. It’s a reverberating sampledelic pysch-jazz workout that’ll have Radio 3’s ‘Mixing It’ crew creaming their avant pants. Then there’s ‘All The Wrong Places’, where he hooks up with Akira The Don for a manic, jerky, rapping head-rush thang. And as for ‘Spiders’, well that’s just plain visceral and evil. An abrasive sock in the head underpinned by frenetic breaks lurking low in the mix. Elsewhere Mothboy draws from ‘Illbient’ (brownie points for anyone who remembers that Wire championed stylee!) or Meat Beat Manifesto. But none of this is by numbers, folks. Mothboy simply appropriates the cloth, chews it up, then flies off to wherever his warped wings take him. Take ‘Folk’… a different fettle of kish altogether: a chilled, global, otherworldly vignette. However, as is typical of such artists, you can’t pop along to Woolies for this cos you’ll get a blank look. Hence, get yer butt along to Sister Ray in Soho’s Berwick Street, or order ‘The Fears’ via the label's website at www.adnoiseam.net. Sorted.

Gal Détourn (courtesy of the Play Louder website)

Debut album release for Simon Smerdon, a.k.a Mothboy, The Fears is a monstrously dark album that allows in enough light to cast shadows that are genuinely fascinating. It also helps that Smerdon wisely uses untreated guitar, bass and live drums to give his music an added, authentic edge.

We Don’t Ride With Vampyres sets the tone of the album, a sprawling, nightmarish instrumental. Picture a rain flooded dark alley; what is that moving in the bins? Smerdon teasingly takes you where you don’t want to go. The following X In His Territory is equally absorbing, as live instrumentation merges with programmed beats and primordial electronics to create more murky atmospheres. Second Spin R.I.P. broadens the sound, introducing a strong jazz element; this has an incredible Ronnie Scott ambience - you can almost inhale the thick cigarette smoke hanging in the air. A303 rides on the back of the albums hot streak, another halluciogenic instrumental, where taken substances merge with the bright city lights – you’re there, but not really there - it works on many levels.

Occasionally, Mothboy’s use of live percussion and dark electronica reminds me of the disbanded dark funk outfit Red Snapper, which is no bad comparison. Spiders is another beauty, which begins with big beats and cyber rhythms, before breaking down into the world of film soundtrack, as one-fingered low-end synth keys produce gravely serious stacked layers. Smerdon continues to challenge on Folk, introducing a jittery tribal rhythm, overlayed with heavily reverbed plucked banjo. Sounds freakish, but when you’re genuinely unafraid to experiment, risks usually pay off.

The only track on The Fears I’m not too enamoured with is All The Wrong Places, an unbalancing rap track that takes too much of a leftfield jump and distracted me. That was unnecessary, and it takes a while to get the disappointment out of your system before we’re dragged back into another sleazy jazz club effort, on the saxaphone-ridden Rewind, Erase & Replace. The Fears never really recovers its focus from this point onwards, despite closing with the the sludgy, urban sprawl of Becoming Solar, the short, nightmarish Fear Baby Fear, and the lengthiest track on the album, the intoxicating but listless, Shakes. The Fears is a richly varied slab of dark electronica, beautifully produced and full of richly authentic atmospheres. Despite a slight abhorration towards the end, you shouldn’t be put off buying what is at times a wonderfully visceral debut album, especially if you like your electronica darker than dark.

rated 8.3 out ot 10

.... (courtesy of the Barcode Ezine website)

Mothboy is Simon Smerdon, a guy from London who has been very active in the underground music scene for many years. Smerdon used to be part of the dark-hop outfit Ocosi, and released several CD’s and Cdr’s as Ocosi, Mothboy and Dicelab before this solo album called ‘the fears’ was released.

‘The fears’ contains various elements that clearly have different influences. There is the massive bass which remind of Scorn or Techno Animal, the rhythms are influenced by hip-hop as well as electro, and the sounds used can be compared to countless other genres. Mothboy uses drones, vocals, glitches, strings, jazz and roots samples and so on. The whole can best be compared to a crossover between Scorn and Amon Tobin, or perhaps to a downtempo version of hymen’s Substanz-t. The atmosphere is warm, raw and abstract and is certainly very original.

On this CD, Mothboy used sound sources by Scorn, Larvae, Horchata and Akira the Don, and this album will certainly be appreciated by fans of the projects mentioned.

.... (courtesy of the Funprox website)