Zwaremachine is a one-man industrial band by Mach Fox from Minneapolis, USA which instantly blew me away! So today I will be reviewing the album Be A Light, which is described as Minimal Hypnotic Industrial Body Music. This album came out on April 11th, 2018.
It starts off with Pulse, which slowly eases you in to the album. Very atmospheric, I immediately picture myself in a smoky club slowly stomping to it. Then BOOM, comes Our Revenge, making you want to dance even more! Reminds me a little bit of Skinny Puppy and maybe Ministry.
The title track Be A Light moves you more into EBM territory, but still keeps that old school industrial sound. Ieyei is similar, but with more synth. Another Way is also really cool, and energy pumping. And then comes Drknrg, which is even better, haha! Fitting name, really (dark energy). I really like the spoken word in it too, it fits really well.
Then we have Person To Person - the energetic music doesn’t stop! But at the end it does slow down a little, which is fitting since this technically is the last song. The rest of the album (14 tracks) consists of multiple remixes of Our Revenge, Be A Light, Ieyei, Another Way and Person To Person.
I really like Be A Light (Audiocentesis Remix) - and Person To Person (TIMMY the TAPEWORM P2P on PCP Remix) is insane, haha! Be A Light (ENDIF Remix) is really unique - and Person To Person (Paul Birken Remix) is cool too! The album ends with Be A Light (Planktoon Remix) which is also great and danceable, and fades out in the end, cushioning you after all that dancing).
So overall a pretty good album - a little long, but I didn’t mind. The intro gives a great buildup to an epic dance session. If you like industrial and EBM, make sure to check out this album! You can buy it digitally on Bandcamp, and physically (as well as merch) here.
I also quickly want to mention that he released a new free single last month called Remain Unseen! It’s really great, and I love the description of it: ‘‘Its a cranky noisey bit of cyber darkwave data scraped off a disk found in a pool of hydraulic fluid on an abandoned warehouse floor where a technocybercult has been hiding.’’ Download it here! Can’t wait to hear more from him.
If you find yourself in the Netherlands or Germany, you can catch him at POPEI Eindhoven (NL) on January 19th, KIR Hamburg (DE) on january 24th, and PNN Heerlen (NL) on january 26th!
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