- Electric, adventurous techno on Blawan and Pariah's label.
- "OK, let's go. Right now. Dance floor." This is roughly the reaction I had to "Black Alert," the A1 on Peder Mannerfelt's new EP. The plan ran aground upon remembering it was Wednesday morning, but the feeling of needing to hear these tracks loud on a club system has persisted. Mannerfelt appears to write releases with a particular theme or idea in mind, and it seems that being asked to contribute the third release on Pariah and Blawan's Voam label inspired him to write the meanest techno of his career.
This being Mannerfelt, don't expect techno in the traditional sense. The sound design and rhythms are suggestive of an artist who thinks the genre still has plenty of new things left to say. You'll sense this in the demanding push-pull groove of "Everywhere, Everywhere," where Mannerfelt uses awful blasts of white noise to almost sophisticated ends. It's there in the choice of sampled voice and emotional breakdown/drop on "A Queen," a real "How the fuck did he think of that?" moment. "Summercase 2006" is a rippling drum track of pure bad attitude, a simple workout that still feels very now. The pterodactyl-like synths on "Black Alert" are what stands it apart, the kind of line that makes a drug high higher. In addition to this being a continuation of Mannerfelt's incredible recent form, Like We Never Existed arrives at a time when both Blawan and Karenn, his project with Pariah, are writing some of the very best techno out there. The hype is real on this one.
TracklistA1 Black Alert
A2 Everywhere, Everywhere
B1 Summercase 2006
B2 A Queen