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DOOM reborn, as a computer warfare edition
When in 1993 The Mover’s debut album “The Final Sickness” came out on Planet Core Productions (PCP), a new video game called DOOM was about to hit the market. Without being an expert in that particular field, I believe that DOOM stood for the extreme side of video gaming, side by side with another shooter madness Wolfenstein. When drawing parallels to techno, similar type of brutality and irritation characterised the efforts of PCP, a fraternity led by Marc Trauner aka Marc Acardipane with his countless aliases in Frankfurt am Main. It was a symbol of the early nineties and its crucial moments have been covered in this blog before, because it used to play an essential role in my understanding of electronic music’s harder side and true fans still miss the untamed atmosphere of their heyday.
After a long hibernation, new signals are now transmitted from Acardipane and more precisely from The Mover when an album lands on Killekill’s sublabel Boidae. Strictly speaking, this delivery is a few months late, because of the numerological magic of the PCP posse – when they once manifested ‘See ya in 2017!’ -, many hardcore heads anticipated news in 2017. Even though Boidae released a collection of remastered classics, we had to wait until this year to see The Mover reappearing with a full-length.
The Mover can be regarded almost an ‘heady’ branch of the Planet Core structure – while 6-Pack, Leathernecks, etc. stand for the totally opposite end -, and this impression prevails also in the new album. The tracks are industrial, robust, partly abstract and not necessarily meant for raving from dusk till dawn. And I have to admit, several of them do not reflect the intensity we know from PCP’s early phase.
A clear exception is “Dark Comedown”, a standout old school beast that opens with marching bass and militant snare drum before gathering speed with apocalyptic riffs. Credit is also due to “Doom Computer”, another floor weapon carried by the screams of mutant vultures. In our days, electro elements are becoming compulsory in new releases and it’s not any different here. Dark cinematic atmosphere of “Stars Collapse” wins over “Shadow Deception” that could be a decent electro tune without a passage of hysterical horns. After a very promising thumping intro with trance sediment, aggressive grooves give a good push to “Stealth”, which shares the patterns with “Calculations”.
While The Mover’s return is very welcome, in comparison to PCP’s early output I’m tempted to admit that the grass was greener before. Despite of some captivating tracks, the album doesn’t fully meet my expectations and it feels like playing DOOM with 1993 graphics, but the battleground has changed and the warriors are engaged in visually less spectacular cyber wars. Thus I’m missing the vintage feel in the album.
Hopefully Acardipane’s rave cluster will be reactivated at some point of time, to bring back acts like Ace The Space, Nasty Django, Mescalinum United or even some unknown alias(es), with lost tapes or refurbished ideas for further enjoyment.