Release Date: 4 September 2007
Song Count: 12
Rating: 7.3/10
Description:
Another quick break from others' suggestions to present my own discovery, today's album finds us firmly back in Breakcore territory with an artist I newly, discovered, I Broke My Robot. The Virginia-based producer, who goes by Robert or "Robbie" as his name behind the project, has had a sporadic presence in the particular scene of extreme electronica, only releasing a few projects long after he published this initial record - though that is far from a valid reason to discredit his work within a genre as out-there as breakcore that allows even smaller creators to breathe life into it and make a sustainable impact. Engaging in what is described as a mix-up between breakcore and flashcore, I Broke My Robot dabbles in quickly chopped beats and sounds whilst also adding an ambient and slightly emotive undertone to the project as to weight it with additional meaning beyond merely a result of a sonical experiment.
The cuts, chops, distortions and mixing frame the general sound of 'tomorrow does not exist' as not only machine-like, but also piercing with many of the sounds being chosen and utilised being quite sharp on the ear. The machinations created within the album contain fast, harsh and unpredictable beats and what can best be described as micro-rhythms that at times go far beyond the comprehension of most who may not be used to these speeds in any elements of electronical music. Underneath these percussive jumbles are occasional glimpses of dramatic drones and other sorts of tools and effects to be found that then provide an icy and haunting edge to the tracks that almost seem to tell a story within them - or at least, vaguely express subtle emotions that could be associated with one another and stitched together into a narrative when combined with some of the tragic-sounding titles of the tracks.
The latter effect is one that could be debated on its true presence within the music, however, as the sheer extent of how layered and "read-between-the-lines" it appears to be could make it pass off as simply imaginations running wild on some sort of meaning that the original artist may not have initially intended. To try to definitively point at a deeper understanding beyond just sidelined melodics playing around with each other and titles that hint at a greater picture is not something one can truly do with this album, and so the best way to mentally extract the most out of the listening experience is to go at it with a simple expectation of a series of hardcore, old-school breakcore tracks that do what the style characteristically does - nothing more, nothing less.
The specific track "Fear, Love and the Endless Suffering" is the one where both the percussioning and the background composition work best in tandem with one-another, and could be considered the closest thing to a track in the record attempting to invoke emotions in the form of expressing tragedy, dread and other charged sensations in a breakcore-ified way. But even aside from the named song, there is plenty here to dig into for fans of electronic extremities that get a mental itch scratched by the sounds of impossibly rapid beats and sounds whirling around. Overall, a decent listen if you're into this kind of stuff like yours truly is!