It’s topped off with a pitched-down meditation on 9/11 that sounds less maudlin than grimly resigned. But 2007’s “Blood on My Hands” stands apart, carefully balancing quicksilver percussion and diffuse chords. Shackleton’s uniformly sepulchral mood and extensive use of the same ethnomusicological drum samples lead much of his voluminous catalog to blend together and that’s just fine — neither dub nor drum circles reinvent the wheel every time, after all. Uncluttered, with phlegmy bass and crunchy-cereal claps, the San Franciscan’s most popular tune ratchets up the tension with “Zarathustra” kettle drums and refuses to stop the whirligig even as nausea closes in. “Bass Head” evades exhaustion with drops that are worlds away from the Brits’ nasty wobbles — opting instead for sleek, carefully calibrated swoops and curves.
Six-and-a-half bass-swept minutes of delayed gratification. Its spindly needlepoint riff unfurls casually before drifting into lockstep with a head-nodding groove of heart murmurs, slow-burn shudders, and mechanical, paranormal moans. Peverelist – “Roll With the Punches” (2007)Ī lesson in restraint by Tom Ford, the label head of Bristol’s Punch Drunk, luring you into a smothering labyrinth of queasiness and chilling your bones with periodic shocks from looming bass ghosts.
