Ionic Vision - Actual

One of the two members of Ionic Vision, Sven, has between their latest release 'In Between' and now once again become a father. Have the band become cute and sweet because of this fact? Absolutely not in any way, rather I think Sven together with the godfather Andy try to make sure that our beloved Old-School EBM genre is brought to the next generation since Ionic Vision is at least as brutal as before.

Last time this band released a full-length album was in 2002 when they released 'Neumaschinen' and there in between they released an EP 2003 with the fitting name 'In Between'. What do we find in their new release 'Actual' then? Well, exactly what we had expected. Minimal, monotone, hard-hitting EBM alike what we have lately also experienced in Swedish Sturm Café.

In the last few years we have gotten used to that the band perform their tracks in the English language, but here we once again are able to enjoy some German words in "Ich Will" and also, very unexpected, French words in "L'usine" which is pretty rare in this genre. What more interesting tracks is there to mention on this album with 12 songs? As usual quite a bunch, but I would really like to highlight sexual hysterical "Watching You", rumbling "Breaker", hard-hitting "Sin" and for you out there that want to faint on the dance floor of exhaustion I recommend "Back Again".

I think that 'Actual' is not as strong as 'Neumaschinen' was, but pretty damn close.

This review was written 2005 and initially published on Neurozine.com Jan 01 2005