Statiqbloom
The Casket Nest
Hands Productions
The change in style 2022’s Threat signified for Fade Kainer’s long-standing Statiqbloom project met a mixed reception with us at ID:UD. On the one hand Kainer’s production style was well prepared and suited for the shift to a monochromatic, unremitting stream of modern dark techno that record heralded. On the other, the psychedelic approach to electro-industrial and dark electro Statiqbloom had always taken, working subtle iridescent shades into classically aggressive forms, was something distinct and refreshing about Kainer’s work which was harder to locate in those blunter techno releases. While not representing another sharp stylistic turn, The Casket Nest does stray somewhat from the path cleaved by Threat and Kain, with a good portion of the record owing more to classic powernoise than modern dark techno.
The speedy dash of opener “Spectrum In The Thread Of A Spiders’s Web” soon reveals itself to be focused on the waxing and waning splashes of distortion coming off its hi-hat-like percussion moreso than the weight of its kicks. It sounds like a minor point, but as it carries on the ostensibly rapid-fire tempo of the track fades into the background, supplanted by the slower cycles of noise in a manner quite similar to classic Imminent Starvation. Kainer’s wounded yowl, blustering its way through the staccato stabs of “A Knife From Above”, draws a line between plenty of vintage Hands and Ant-Zen artists and their first wave industrial predecessors.
There are still a number of tunes which feel of a piece with Threat and Kain. Despite its intermittent swoops of distortion and barks from Kainer, the syncopated, meaty kicks of “Second Sight” and its foreboding background drones are squarely in the modern dark techno pocket. “Into The Depths” splits the difference, with lattices of rising and falling distorted snares (connoting Winterkalte or possibly even early Download) adorning a core kick.
At six original tracks and one instrumental reprise, The Casket Nest is not quite an EP, not quite an LP, and comes on the heels of last December’s Winter, a self-released boutique record which broke radically from Statiqbloom’s past and present, instead trekking into entrancing but harsh death industrial and ambient soundscapes. Whether The Casket Nest represents the next step in ‘main-line’ Statiqbloom releases (and Winter a brief digression) or not, it’s a punishing reminder of how much percussive brutality Kainer can weave into his work, regardless of genre.
