It’s been a good two years since we last heard from London-based duo Dusk & Blackdown on Keysound with their excellent second album ‘Dasaflex’, and now this 2X12” EP ‘Back 2 Go Fwd’ sees them offering up five new tracks alongside three remixes. If anything, this is perhaps a slightly more direct and club-oriented collection of tracks than the often introspective ‘Dasaflex’, with robust grime and garage elements remaining firmly at the forefront. ‘Back 2 Go Fwd’ sees the duo fusing stark sine wave tones with a rippling backdrop of almunium-light garage rhythms that almost carries a slight jazzy shuffle, as eerie spoken MC samples merge with ominous bass tones and creepy ambient synths.
By comparison, ‘Peng One Two’ gets more fluid and elastic, sending a juddering bassline bouncing against blaring horn stabs and MC vocal grabs as the jittery off-beats add a nervous arrhythmia to the skittering snares and percussion fills, before Blackdown’s ‘Timeless’ kicks things out into broken-beat house territory as lithe hi-hats and handclaps arc against wobbling tones and thicky bassy toms, only for things to suddenly get filtered into oblivion. The additional remixes here are no less impressive, with Horsepower reworking Blackdown’s ‘Wicked Vibez’ into a extroverted broken-house roller that occasionally calls to mind Switch or Zero Db with its blaring rave horns, live MC samples and sudden switchbacks. Characteristically strong stuff from Dusk & Blackdown that’s well worth seeking out.
