Bed Of Nails

Shifted

Under A Single Banner

Bed Of Nails

It's been a busy couple of years for the producer behind the Shifted project. On top of an extremely well received album for the Mote Evolver label, the producer has edged further out into the fringes of electronic music under a number of aliases, taking in noise/ambient variants as Covered in Sand, as well as more distorted, technofied productions under the Alexander Lewis moniker, a sound described by the Blackest Ever Black label as "S-M Techno". His new album as Shifted, "Under a Single Banner" finds the producer converging these strands into a lucid reimagining of Techno, starting off from the toughened, purist templates honed down by the likes of Sandwell District and Marcel Dettmann, and stretching out into more textured, sometimes noisy, often introverted and melancholly signatures. It's a perfect fit for Bed of Nails, a label thats given a platform for the more direct dancefloor mutations of Dominick Fernow's own productions as Vatican Shadow, Rainforest Spiritual Enslavement and Christian Cosmos, as well as familiar Hospital Productions affiliates such as Kris Lapke under the Bronze Age guise. There's a rich and earthy warmth to "Under a Single Banner" that's perhaps at odds with the purile fixation on all things noisey at the fringes of Techno these days, but for the most part, the tension and momentum keeps the album definitively aimed at the floor without ever resting on its laurels.

Violet Poison

Awakening Messiah

Bed Of Nails

Dominick "Vatican Shadow" Fernow presents veiled techno producer Violet Poison on his Bed Of Nails imprint with the spectral industrial gloom of 'Awakening Messiah'. To date Violet Poison is best known as the mysterious accomplice of Shaped Noise in their Violetshaped alias - but here he strikes solo, transmitting four cuts of steely, night-stalking cyberpunk driven by sputtering techno engines through intensely bleak synth interzones. Like Black Rain or Vatican Shadow, it's a chilling exercise in transposing techno from pure dancefloor functionality into the nether realms of sonic fiction, maintaining an unbroken mise-en-scene from the aerial autobahn motion of 'Aenigma Messiah' strafed with speeding synths and steady motorik rumble, or encroaching gangs of destitute, bloodthirsty robots in 'Babylon Suicide' and implanting fake memories of misadventure in the PTSD-triggering atmospheres of 'Osiris Antichrist'. It's manna for the shadow dwellers….

Christian Cosmos

The Sharp Lines That Delineate His Robes

Bed Of Nails

In parallel to his Vatican Shadow project, Christian Cosmos has emerged as one of Dominick Fernow's most compelling monikers. The third transmission from his Bed Of Nails imprint yields four intensely gloomy stations in this mode, revolving around a cryptic, as-yet-unresolved agenda borrowing from industrial techno, petrifying synth soundtrack elements and meditative noise clangour with a rudimentary but deeply affective gnosticism. He engages with glowering clarity on 'The Angular Positions of His Father' where sorrowful strings sweep a desolate, martial drum trill and bass drones that liquify at our feet. 'The Angular Positions Of His Ghost' follows, engaging a dread-filled atmosphere with stone-cutting drum machine patterns and guilty synth noise. 'The Angular Positions of His Crown' is possibly the most potent, cold striking the same nerve left raw by his most chilling Vatican Shadow moments, while 'The Angular Positions of His Cross' leaves us hanging in looped torpor, sounding like Muslimgauze having a crisis of faith.

Bronze Age

Antiquated Futurism

Bed Of Nails

Dominick Fernow's Bed Of Nails venture welcomes his longtime co-conspirator Kris Lapke with three tracks of haunting Gothic Techno produced as Bronze Age. Kris used to run the Hospital Productions studio when it was operating in Manhattan. It was there that he galvanized seminal records including Kevin Drumm's 'Imperial Distortion' and Prurient's 'Arrowhead' with his signature post-production and recording techniques, beside corrosive solo work as Alberich and as part of guitar/noise duo Northern Cross with Geoff Mullen. As Bronze Age he's arrived at a murky reflection of Vatican Shadow's recent exploits - albeit lashed with a bruxist brand of Mid-Western Techno and Teutonic Trance arrangements - best heard on the razing Techno weapon 'Surviving Cultural Impedance' or the marching B-side epic 'Modal Ingenuity', two stoically funktional and black klad takes on strains of Acid Techno wrought by Lory D, Speedy J or Woody McBride, only amped with lip-biting Gothic drama. However, the record's finest moment is the slower missive 'Coupling Symbols': a majestic, militant Techno sensation redolent of classic Marc Arcardipane productions and blessed with a rare, positively dystopian atmosphere that's sadly all too absent in much of the contemporary Techno scene.

Vatican Shadow

September Cell

Bed Of Nails

***Bed Of Nails is a new label curated by DOMINICK FERNOW of VATICAN SHADOW and PRURIENT fame. Operating from his recently-consecrated L.A. compound, the label will focus on his reorientation towards industrial dancefloor rhythms and seductively isolated electronics. Fernow christens the label with September Cell, a four track 12" loaded with some of his most direct dancefloor assaults to date. Think hollowed industrial percussion, gloaming synths and caustic noise painting bleakly evocative visions.