EPRC are an experimental Italian duo who seem to have derived their four letter moniker from the initials of the two musicians, Elisabetta Porcinai and Roberto Crippa.  Their music is a kind of digital post-industrial that touches on influences from techno and power electronics.  The only other release on their Bandcamp is a two-track EP from earlier this year, so it seems to be a recent project.... this seven-track LP is their full-length debut.

The sound here is massive- featuring a throbbing, bass-boosted wall of textured rhythm, with Elisabetta's spoken vocals buried mostly underneath.  Her words are sometimes audible when the beats subside: "It is out of control".  It has the warmth and immediacy of analogue hardware performances, paired with the exact frequency curves and intelligent compression structure of digitally produced music.

It feels like a recording that could have been extremely harsh, but due to the way it is processed, with the bass heavily emphasized and the treble masked, it can be played incredibly loud.  This is seemingly intended purpose: to play and simply revel in its sheer power and hugeness, the thunderous tone of its detuned sub bass slams.

The drums and gritty rhythmic textures sound to me like synth percussion, something I've recently delved into myself as I've begun to add drum modules to my Eurorack.  If a Eurorack was involved in the creation of this album, that would make a lot of sense, and in fact, I'm not sure how else some of the sounds would be possible.  The basslines seem to emerge from the kick drums themselves, apparently using the technique of tuned kick drums that include sustain, something not present in older gear.

The feeling of the music is eerie, lonely, paranoid and pessimistic, a perfect fit for 2024 I must say.  At times the thick beats subside, revealing a delicate bed of melancholic ambience, a wisp of icy pads and a rustling of air and wind.  The sort of slow hypnotism found in dark downbeat music like Scorn or various artists from the rhythmic noise scene is combined with the desolate urban feeling of minimal techno.

Bodies is a creative masterstroke.  It takes the pulsing rhythm of techno and pulls it in ever more surreal and existential directions, with oddly syncopated rhythms and eerie ambient breakdowns, and sections where one realizes the 'drums' are hardly drums at all, but a grinding mass of aggressively scribbled complex waves.  The general avant-garde, dystopian feeling here, as well as the expressive vocals, lead me to feel like we are reclaiming some of the existential weight of 80's industrial music that has been largely missing since, as EBM began to dominate industrial charts and clubs, and settled into ever more predictable pop structures. To find out more