K-PIST
Voltage Controlled
[North of No South]
Rating: 6.4
"What the goddamned hell?" may be your initial reaction to K-PIST. After
a minute of a bubbly, bassy sound, a sequenced keyboard takes hold of your
personal space and invades. While the introduction on this disc admittedly
sounds a little like a synthed-up version of Van Halen's "Right Now," it
doesn't take long before Voltage Controlled's first song, "Videogamer"
punches a hole through your speakers.
These guys would be just another grunge/ rap hybrid in the vein of the Red
Hot Chili Peppers and Rage Against The Machine if it weren't for the neat
sounds. Neat sounds? Well... yeah. And they're pretty neat. See, K-PIST
have a gimmick: they've got a high- powered, crazy lead vocalist, a drummer
that knows how to cop with the real, and electronic noisemakers. So, get
this. It's aggressive power-chord, grunged- out rock and roll with no
guitars-- just pissed- off machinery.
K-PIST list their equipment on the album's cover, and though I'm no stranger to
old synth gear, I've never heard of a lot of this stuff. You've got your Orban
EQ, Nordrack, Roland Juno 106, Novation Bass Station and the legendary ARP
Odyssey. If you think you're intrigued right now, wait until you hear it.
Sure these guys don't make the most intelligent music on the planet, but
the key is that it sounds cool. There are also some great rock tracks here.
The catchy "Helicopter," "Uncle Sam" and "Gypsyland" would make nice additions
to the mix if you're DJing for mixed company of rock and electronic fans.
As an added plus, there's a second disc they've put together just so you
can sample from it and look at their cool graphics (the design is top notch,
by the way-- it looks like they used to design the packaging for Intellivision
games). Not bad for a bunch of crazy electro-Swedes. Right?
-Ryan Schreiber