When is an electronically-dominated band not experimental or electro? When it’s an Italian chap named Death Boy who does the ‘voices and noises’ himself. When is it sometimes hard to write a review without sounding overly critical and unnecessarily harsh? When there’s such clear potential which is being strangled too early.

I could be wrong, as the website mentions two people, but this latest of their releases mentions only Death Boy, and he needs mates, a fuller production and has to relinquish the production controls, handing them to someone who knows how to produce. Too many times there are signs of really classy ideas which are allowed to plateau rather than rising through the gears to deliver astonishing results. He crafts his music well, but is clearly limited by his situation, and while I don’t know the band Chrisma, and can’t therefore see if his version of ‘Black Silk Stockings’ differs from theirs, I somehow doubt they had the same muggy vocals which sound hesitant and lacking melodic durability. It has a nice early Fad Gadget feel, mixed with The Normal, and the album’s penultimate track is a shaky, tremulous cover of Joy Division’s ‘Decades’, which is clearly a strong influence as willowy bass incisions occur regularly throughout the album.

So there he/they mainly is/are, back in the 80’s where the sound is lean, and the solid electric nature mainly goes for spacey techno suggestiveness, but the songs always remain well grounded and fairly serious. It’s really just a question of pondering the empty spaces which one person creates. So many of the songs, like the lanky, bounding punky thing which is ‘Sonic Wave’ should have finished in a shower of drum-fuelled sparks, but instead glows gently. ‘Dust’ degenerates into a mangled mess, where a band could have given it strong curves, and the vocals ruin ‘Too Low’ which has a stylish bass presence and hovering synth.

At least his/their options are there. Stop pretending to sing, because the vocals are a waste of space, and work with a good singer, who can maybe play another instrument, or produce? Make it a duo? Be an instrumentalist and drop the energy kick? Or get a band where he’s the main songwriter? It’s got to be better than persevering with this, and just pottering along with good notions which never become full-blooded.

‘Unliked Love’ moves from sci-fi soundscape into a dark storm, ‘Screaming’ is ghostly and yet purposeful, and ‘Screaming’ has fine attitude and tense percussion,
so the basics are all here. It’s just a question of whether Death Boy wants to keep this as a hobby, or get involved with others and really let his music achieve something.

Not much help to you, but then I don’t speak Italian. There’s good stuff on the record, but it could be so much better. Fans of early 80’s electronics may enjoy the mp3s online, so visit the site.

www.mickmercer.com