Rrose - Beware of Shells (2018)

Rrose continues to serve up occasional slabs of mind-altering techno gold, primarily on the Eaux label the producer established in 2012 after parting company with Sandwell District. This year-ending missive is as impressive as it is mind-altering and thought provoking. Opener "Beware of Shells" delivers a trippy and intoxicating blend of rhythmic modular noise and foreboding electronics, before the creepy "Incisors" leads us gently by the hard towards peak-time techno dancefloors. Elsewhere, "The Swelling" serves up buzzing, mangled white noise, "Sister (Remix)" is a psychedelic, mid-tempo modular techno chugger, and closing cut "Pecking Order" is a particularly dystopian chunk of otherworldly ambient.