Get Ready for This

[March 16th, 2005] Forget everything that comes to mind when you hear the word "Techno." It's come a long way from the sweaty gymnasiums of the Detroit underground, and where it's going nobody really knows. But Berlin-based electro-punk "band" Smash TV is at least helping clear the trash from the path, waving an eager goodbye to the days of that crap they play at ballgames and aerobics classes (e.g., "Get Ready!" by 2 Unlimited). Smash TV has carefully dissected that dated sound with an Aphex Twinesque chainsaw, and is standing atop the crop of fresh new producers making their mark in a genre that appeared to be gasping for its final breathes.

Smash TV (whose name references a gory '90s arcade game) excels at pairing crunched-up polyrhythms with alternately menacing and beautiful melodic passages-welding avant-garde and Euro-pop aesthetics together with radical flair. Like a plate of fugu, this music is delicious-but not for the faint of heart.

At first listen, Smash TV-now just Holger Zilske as his former partner, Michael Schmidt, defected to a day job-is unique to the point of being unsettling. On the latest release, Bits for Breakfast, the textures are gravelly and abrupt, often coming across like a drunken modem in an altercation with an AM radio. A few listens beyond the "visceral reaction" state, however, reveal wild creativity and sophistication that music futurists, DJ's and critics alike have widely acclaimed.

It might sound at first like Smash TV's music is as heartless as the video game its named after. And the world of Smash TV is a grim and violent place, but unlike the namesake, this is an entertainment experience that is not one-dimensional. If you've heard Ellen Allien's lushed-up speedball-of-an-album Berlinette, then you've got an idea of the texture, as the album was coproduced by Smash TV. On that masterpiece, Zilske injected his baroque noise confections throughout the landmark recording, if with slightly softened edges, smartly adapting to Ellen's angelic voice.

Further evidence of Zilske's stylistic imagination is right up front on the first track of Bits for Breakfast. On "Queen of Men," the album's curiously titled first single, Zilske demonstrates the will to escape his own hard-edged reputation for a refreshingly vacuous tangent. The song lays in with a familiar disco groove, delivered squeaky-clean without a drop of pretense. Never breaking character, Smash TV's jagged exterior is now dropped in exchange for a layer of glitter and sequins. Strangely, this sonic drag sounds surprisingly sincere. Exuberant and Moroderesque, the piece is buoyed by androgynated guest vocalist Raz Ohara, unashamedly attacking the mic in strung-out Hedwig fashion.

The Smash TV sound is usually a far cry from retro, though references to late-'80s/early-'90s industrial pop are too pronounced to ignore. It makes sense that the pop culture world would follow its '80s revival with a little '90s nostalgia, and, yes, that is a scary thought. But, if the '90s rears its ugly head, and ends up sounding like Smash TV, it will be most welcome.