»Maintenance Werk« by Datassette

We found Datassette after he linked to Monotonik from his own artist website. Fortunately, it turns out that he hearts us, and we heart him, since the UK-based artist with the retro-hardware themed pseudonym cuts up a lovely mix of previous Monotonik artists like Vim! and Braces Tower, alternating funky electronica with the geekier bleep end of the spectrum, but coming out all wine and roses in the originality stakes.

Starting out with the BBC Radiophonic Workshop drift of ‘Microfocus’, it’s straight into ‘Hidden Area’, all smooth digital funk crossed with bass vistas you can see for miles, before the herky-jerky digital funk of ‘Computers’ cuts a fine sinelike rug. Moving on swiftly, we become lodged inside a funkbox with the surprisingly sharp ‘Zigzag’, before ‘Eyeballs and Elbows’ continues along the fine, unconventional digifunk path, and perhaps the jewel in the crown, ‘Synthesize’, comes off oddly ’80s, with breathless vocals and ticking bass. Finally, ‘Run Human!’ has a scary robot exhorting us all to, likely, run for the hills. But actually, we all want to come closer and admire Datassette’s handiwork, right? Right.