Impressive troll to link two of the most shadowy introverts in music and drop a single in the midst of sweltering global heat wave. I’d expect nothing else from Zomby and Burial, who blend ghetto-tech, 2-step, the sounds of rave, UFO sounds, and what I think is the sound of an elephant safari in Namibia getting invaded by robots and all the white-suited hunters mercifully slaughtered. So it is a usual unusual song from these two. Burial has been absent for a long time, theoretically making a clutch of singles to drop around Christmas time when no one is paying attention.
I’m not sure who did what to this song, but all the hallmarks of Burial are there. If the cliche is “subway music,” Burial channels the twisted shrapnel lying underneath. This is emotional carnage music, rivers of blood underneath the train tracks, disembodied snippets with a scrambled “yeah me fucked up” and “my whole life.” The drums seem to try to dodge the explosions. There is something beastly and insistent, as though we’re being carried on a conveyer belt into a club studded with landmines. If you can make political music without words, this would be it. The sort of migraine violence embedded in popular culture, tense neurotic liminal tales for this slowly rotating powder keg. The song is called “Sweetz” but of course, shit ain’t.
