Tensal - Perpetual Survivor EP [Mord]

Dark, driving techno producer Tensal brings a pagan, cult-like atmosphere to the arch of techno orthodoxy with his latest record 'Perpetual Survivor.' With an ominous heraldic symbol on the 12" inner label, and a four-track sonic palette that portrays the seedier sides of religiosity, this is a record that evokes the solemnity of Downwards Records' Birmingham school or the post-Catholic heresies of Vatican Shadow. Opening track, 'Sonic Particle Rain', lashes out with a blast of sonic madness that breaks with the status quo by way of stuttering sixteenth notes and screeching bass, while 'Ethos' sets itself apart from the crowd with a personal, textural reflection on what it means to follow one’s own ethical code. Meanwhile, 'Perpetual Survivor' and 'Nemesis' strip things back to their barest essentials, resulting in a kind of puritanical Reformation in sound; the gilded adornments of their clerical predecessors starkly contrasted by the electric, merciless and austere sound of the B-side.