Libythth – Upside Down Helicopter (Phthalo)

It’s been quite some time since Los Angeles-based electronic producer Qrqyt Ixoteptek (possibly not the name his parents gave him) last released new material under his Libythth moniker; indeed, after releasing 2000’s ‘Dizzolve A Diamond’ and 2001’s ‘Almost A Trillion Dollars’ on Phthalo, he’s spent much of the next ensuing decade virtually inactive. Apparently five years in the making, this third album ‘Upside Down Helicopter’ sees Libythth returning to action, and shows him continuing to ply a distinctly individual, eccentric and furiously beatladen path that sits well outside the established boundaries of the breakcore scene. After emerging with the sampled noise of whirling helicopter blades, opening track ‘YTYTYAXOTYYTN’ certainly accelerates rapidly into the sort of corkscrewing Amen breaks that have become the hallmark of breakcore, but rather than descending into the usual rhythmic warfare, the baffling genre colision of sampled drums, hammering kickdrums, cheesy cheap synths and chugging, rock guitars that follows calls to mind the likes of The Boredoms circa ‘Chocolate Synthesiser’, far more than say, Sickboy or Kid 606. The same certainly applies to ‘Cracknsmackattack’s eccentric collision of mantra-like repetitive drums and strangely Arabic-sounding melodic elements, which suggest strange ‘outsider’ rock more than anything else as jittering, hyperactive rhythms power their way to the surface, as well as ‘Foikydoikys’ descent into cheesy, square-dance style arcade game synths and Casiotone-worthy rhythms. Yes, it’s certainly suitably odd stuff that won’t appeal to everyone, but those with a taste for Libythth’s breakcore ‘outsider’ tendencies are likely to find these ten tracks developing more of an indescribable coherency with each ensuing listen.