- Sit through the first two minutes of T. Williams' "Break Broke" and you might think you actually encountered an early Night Slugs. Twisted vocal samples, plastic drums and harshly bent synths, it sounds like a Girl Unit leftover. But then magic happens: those elements fall away to reveal a bulldozing rhythm section, made from what sounds like live drums. Throw in gritty bass barbs that sound like they were lifted from the Musical Mob vaults, and you've got yourself a banger. By the time those more playful elements come back in, they're being pushed around by the cruelly indifferent drums, prodded like cattle by the sawtooth bassline.
"Go In" is quaint in comparison, but it charges with the same determined strut and percussive dynamics of prime Deep Teknologi cuts like "Afric," balancing a rigid vocal sample on drums that dip and dance. Moving firmly into the present, the cheeky "Analog Tour" is a winkingly literal spin on certain producers who pride themselves on old hardware. Try not to break a smile when the robot voice announces the percussive section with a drawn-out "eight-oh-eight," or when a surging gurgle swells up immediately after the "three-oh-three." In fact, it's hard not to break a smile at any of this stuff: Williams has been on a roll since his return, but now it seems like he's dipping back into his grime roots and what it brings to his sound renders it all the more potent.
Tracklist A Break Broke
B1 Go In
B2 Analog Tour