Exclusive: Watch the disturbing new offering from Brooklyn experimental quartet Netherlands.
If you've never done psychoactive drugs in a big city, listening to Netherlands will give you an idea of what the experience is like. The Brooklyn-based experimental quartet add a steady, almost industrial beat to much of their music that instills the listener with the metropolitan feeling of being trapped in a circuitboard. At the same time, the band use said beats so erratically, and surround them with such queasy and deranged synths and bass, that their music feels panicked and hysterical, all while vocalist Timo Ellis moans in your ear like a robot's ghost. It's this sort of avant-garde yet sensually-pleasing atmosphere that has made the band a favorite of musicians like Mastodon's Bill Kelliher and Gojira's Joe Duplantier.
The band's new animated video for the track Zombie Techno comes at you with a two-headed approach of alt-comix psychedelia and existential terror. Directed and designed by Kenny Curwood, the video uses a stark, New Yorker cartoon-style of animation to show the entire human condition, from primordial stew, to go-going corpse-to-be, to unholy god-pyramid, with moments of face-stuffing and skin-melting throughout. All the while, the universe smirks and laughs at mankind's attempts to put their pointless existence to a danceable rhythm.
According to frontman Timo Ellis, "The theme of this song, as well as our entire new wave of material, is a comment on the illusion of community and civic participation that's become the currency of all the new media platforms. Virtually everyone is constantly feeding overlapping algorithms that are sustained by a near-constant supply of curated narcissism, which while outwardly appearing to be 'issue driven,' much more often than not, don't actually reflect any kind of real world action or real coalition-building or organization, whatsoever."
Watch our exclusive premiere of Zombie Techno below:
Zombie Techno will appear on Netherlands' next album, currently in the works for a 2020 release.
Make sure to catch the band at their upcoming show at Brooklyn Bazaar on October 24 with Flipper and Soul Glo.
