TraKKtor - Blitzkrieg Galaxy

Unless you have this site bookmarked at a retarded location, and don't know how to use the front page, you'll already be aware of this single due to the news article.
Since last year's "Force Majeure" full-length, Trakktor have built up a sturdy reputation as an act that seldom put a foot wrong. The impact that the first single from the band, 'Veil of Thorns' had is something most people won't forget.

'Blitzkrieg Galaxy' has exactly the same feeling of imminent success. The riff that it is structured around sounds like an end-times siren, the chorus is very very strong, the lyrics are excellent, and the cover art is just great! This is EBM as it should be - danceable, strong-minded, full of classic samples, and able to make you think deeply.

Early criticisms come by looking at the tracklisting : Four remixes may be too many, and I'd love a b-side track, but I think this is one of those songs that, if done well, can be remixed to hell and back.

In summarising, the original track itself is textbook, and gives more reason than ever to support this Swedish trio. I'm prepared to say it's the best track they've written yet.

Now, where this release gets REALLY interesting is the introduction of Swedish act 'Chaos All Stars' as remixers for track two. This is one of a dozen acts i'm currently watching like a hawk, and with one split ep available via bandcamp, and the utility of Kari Berg (Ex - Ashbury Heights) on vocals, C.A.S. are an act that you won't struggle to hear of in 2012.
As a remix, they appear to have stripped the hoarser, more desolate feel of the single, and replaced it with a slightly more danceable, if not less eventful approach. It works.

I always struggle to generate interest when I haven't heard of a remixer, and I'm not sure I immediately know who David Elg is, but the third track on here belongs to him, and this is flesh-bare restructuring from the very foundations. The slow pace it carries, the unexpected introduction of the vocals, and the introduction of what I can only class as half dub, half breakcore, makes it perhaps the truest remix on the single, as it's pretty much a different song.

Prototyp's remix is the shortest track by over a minute, but it's also easily the most danceable. It falls between Dark Electro and Aggrotech, it's as fast as Usain Bolt chasing someone stealing his car keys, and the vocals are mixed in to make this deliver the beats like an apocalypse of aggression. It gets the concept of the song, and it's what you'd expect a remixer to do - everything he has done with this track reflects the nature of the original, and it carries the artist's own sound with ease.

The last remix is by 'X-Ploding Head Syndrome' (your guess is as good as mine), and it has an underlying, echoey, 'big-bass' sound that is almost choral. It's not rewriting any genres, but it's well worth the listen.

As a writer who hates 'all-remix' releases, especially when the cardinal sin of only putting one song on the entire disc is committed, I have little bad to say about this single.

Trakktor are back, and let's be honest, who isn't gonna check this out? Feb 16 2012