Ten new tracks from those kings & queens of stripped to the bone, slowburn noir-sex- disco..building on the critical success of their 2008 release Marry Me Tonight - listed in Wire magazine and NME (8/10) and somehow found its way into the hearts and bedrooms of the disaffected youths (and young at heart) they were aiming for. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs took them on tour, as did The Horrors. In January 2010, wanting to start something new, HTRK organised a tech-noir party at Cargo London with Factory Floor and unsung electro genius Andrea Parker. After years of living on a slippery slope, Bassist Sean Stewart committed suicide in March 2010. Jonine Standish and Nigel Yang s resolve strengthened - Work (Work,Work) also sees them take complete control of the producing and mixing duties that build on the skin tight tension of the the first album and develop it to a darker, even more twisted world view. They completed their album in the months following and played a comeback show at the ICA described by the NME as being of purging redolent beauty . Stewart s death will not help HTRK shake the common description of them as dark, despite their intentions. But the new album Work (work, work) is a record of heartbreak, finding another world, with soft allusions to the future. Darkness has been overplayed; it s too representational now. HTRK do not aim for pitch black or lights off... it s a murkier, more mysterious, heavy space.
P**N
Emobied sex
Embodies the dark sensual ambient auralgisms I love HTRK for. I'll keep looking for more; they're still keeping their sexy style even after Sean passed.
S**L
HTRK – Work (Work, Work)
The cool iciness and German spoken-word sample of "Ice Eyes Eis" that starts off HTRK's WORK (WORK, WORK) gives an idea of where the album will take the listener, and the art-rock drone of "Slo Glo" only reinforces this. A languorous melancholy hangs over the tracks here, and it lets the tracks drifts from one to the other, without much distinction between the individual songs. The deep bass hits of "Bendin'," for instance, aren't too different from the dirge percussion and guitar of "Synthetik." Though they excel at crafting a mood, the mood stays too consistent and it doesn't give the album as a whole dynamic or emotional range. "Work That Body," for instance, does not get one to actually work one's body. But still, the dark beauty of "Love Triangle" is enough to cement that they're quite adept at their particular genre, and even as "Body Double" incrementally ups the tempo, the darkness remain omnipresent.
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