Ever watched Melancholia, the Lars von Trier examination of depression? You know the one, there’s a rogue planet on a collision course with the Earth which is about to end all life as we know it. It’s hardly your epic Summer blockbuster and to be honest, what it lacks (aside from less pomposity) is a suitable soundtrack. If you ever wanted to know what the apocalypse sounded like, here is your definitive answer. It’s Black Futures. It’s Never Not Nothing. It’s bloody marvellous.
For a couple of years now, the London based duo have been touring, evolving and dropping the occasional track, most of which are collected here in all their sinister, bile-spitting glory. My job here, is to distil their very essence into around 500 words whereas, in truth, I could wax lyrical for an entire tome. Their Facebook page describes them as “A no-holds-barred aural assault of Anarchic Electro Psych Punk Noise that is something like Death From Above and the Chemical Brothers‘ bastard offspring” which isn’t even close. Throw in some acid-soaked NIN and you’re starting to see a vague picture emerge.
‘Love‘ might sound like a blissed out, wistful Summer lullaby but in reality it’s like a slab of granite dropped from space has landed in your back garden. The track should come with a health warning, turn up the percussion and your walls will probably melt. My insides now feel like I’ve swallowed a vat of scotch bonnet peppers. That’s immediately followed by ‘Karma Ya Dig?‘ which is fooling no one, this isn’t paying homage to the Sixties although the swirling opening hints at days of yore before engaging 5th gear and hurtling into cyber-mysticism, if that’s even a ‘thing’.
Others less charitable than myself may pour oodles of scorn over Black Futures due to the sloganeering, the faux futurism and the age-old trick of shoe-horning Bobby Gillespie onto a track to offer up immediate kudos and authenticity. Yet Gillespie is more than a mere token gesture, ‘ME.TV‘ is an anthemic, buck-up-your-ideas, we’re-going-to-hell-in-a-handcart banger of a track, an End Of Days endorsement for the lazy, the uncaring and the oppressive. Stop thinking only of yourself and consider the rest of mankind is the stark message but to the beat of an apocalyptic death march which indicates they believe the fight to be over and we are all losers.
All of the worlds ills are laid bare here, the futility of human existence ‘Body and Soul‘, the scourge that is Capitalism, ‘Riches‘ and single-minded selfishness ‘Tunnel Vision‘ just add to the claustrophobic cul-de-sac into which we’ve blindly driven. Pull apart their mantra and it’s simplistic. Play nicely, look after your neighbour, don’t destroy the planet but deep down we all know we’ve failed. What Black Futures are imploring is that we go down fighting, waving our flag of human independence to the accompaniment of the primeval ‘Power Drunk‘ as we sit astride the nearest hilltop watching our own individual rogue planet descend towards us. Never Not Nothing is astonishingly ambitious, angry and alluring in equal measure. The existential foundations of my life are in ruins, not to mention the new shelving I just put up.
Never Not Nothing is simply what it says. It is something.
Never Not Nothing is out on 30th August on Music For Nations
