Bleep

Pinch’s excellent Cold Recordings imprint sign up Berlin’s Phon.O for their latest drop. As one might expect from a label boss of such high esteem and an artist who has previously released via the likes of Tectonic, BPitch Control and 50WEAPONS, Schutt Und Asche contains three tracks of genre-bending club fodder. Opener ‘CLU5T3R’ comes across like a mutated Funkystepz offshoot, with an almost-two-step bent out of shape until it becomes a pummelling 130 bpm banger. ‘V3R5U5’ contains a similarly stuttering beat, but the muted synth work has more in common with the techno Phon.O’s native city is known for. After two takes of jagged drum tracking, ‘H4NDCUFF3D’ rounds the EP out with a dark, beguiling four-on-the-floor.