Track Premiere: Phal:Angst – “Unhinged (Lustmord Version)”

Photo by Kurt Prinz

Industrial-electronic/dark ambient pioneer Lustmord (aka Brian Williams) lends his talents to a new track, “Unhinged (Lustmord Verson),” from Austrian post-rock collective Phal:Angst on the quartet’s upcoming fifth album, Whiteout. The sprawling eight-minute soundscape offers a tense blending of Phal:Angst’s more traditional post-rock instrumentation—ph (vocals/harp/xylophone), al (guitar/vocals), : (bass), angst (electronics)—with Lustmord’s ominous electronics. The piece features a strong, prominent bass line; loping rhythm; repetitive guitar riff, growled vocals; and electronic atmospherics—like a demonic reggae dub track. It’s psychedelic, pulsing, dark and haunting.

The eight-track Whiteout was assembled over five months with help from Alexandr Vatagin, Gerhard Potuznik, Alexander Lausch  and Tobias Wöhrer who were involved in producing, consulting, recording, mixing and mastering the record. It will be issued on CD, cassette and digitally on January 13 via Noise Appeal/Rough Trade. EU preorders can be placed here. US preorders will be available at a later date.

Angst talks about how Lustmord’s music inspired him in his early musical journey:

“Being a former bass player in punk bands, it helped me transcend the barrier between punk and electronics, which was still seen as [normal] in the 1990s.”

Lustmord had this to say about his contribution to the track:

“I don’t consider my interpretation a ‘remix’ in the accepted sense, as 90 percent of the original sound and structure was replaced. I think of it more as a version, both in the dictionary sense of the word and as a nod to the early reggae B-Side ‘version’ from which dub was born.”