Das Kombinat – Homunkulus

They are a due who have the most radical hairstyles you might concievably come across on a good day. This, their third cassette opens gradually with the strangely muted Industrial sounding "Intro", a grey piece of sound over which painful keyboards and metallic sounds clatter in an asphyxiating atmosphere which grows and mutates. "Maschinen Zeitaltersex" follows in a bright sub-242 sound over which much echoed voices wash. While it rarely sways from it's set pattern,. it still makes for good 1istening. "Motoren Für Kampfmaschinen" sounds decidedly odd, seeming to walk a thin line between order and chaos, managing to keep within the strict limits of the beat. Distorted vocals seem perfectly at home on this track. The title track "Homunkulus" comes next, sounding like didgeridoo over a repetitive drum pattern - a track that grows on you as you listen. "Maschinelle Fertigung" is an odd rhythm with distortion and feedback added in a sort of 'musical' way - not just left to fester. "Chemozombie" opens to white noise/warm noise blocks, changing in complex ways which seem to suggest there's more involved than there actually is. This is one of my favourite tracks on the album, mainly because you can t quite tell how it's put together - it could be concrete, but somehow seems too 'controlled', in a random sort of way. The voices over the top are distorted & grate at the ears reminding one of early CV. "Videomensch" is a lot brighter. although no less complex in composition - this one is based around a drum truck, albeit a strangely disconnected one. The vocals on this have been turned into White Noise Smog.
Side two opens with the dense "Mutter Plastik" which throbs and hums while a CASIO-sounding keyboard makes absurd passes at it and the vocalist intones again like early CABS. "Kampfroboter" comes in on an air of tension and threat, thrashing it's way through to a conclusion. "Menschinterface" sounds as if there are sounds hidden which right be detrimental to your health. It throbs and groans, building to painful climaxes, dropping away to relative quiet while the vocalist intones words without apparent emotion. "Kopfoszillator" is a distinctly Industrial rhythm, a feedback squeal of unoiled hinges on some torture-chamber door. "Fließbandarbeit" is a complex rhythm which might develops into a full-flight E.B.M. track, but decides instead to stick to strangeness. "Unterhaltungs - Electronik" is another distorted electronic thing with 'underwater' vocals - it's good stuff, and wouldn't seem out of place on a "Best Of Industrial" album - they manage to capture the original spirit in this music. "Regelsystem" again visits true industrial music - again strange mechanical sounds rise and form strange rhythns - another damn good track - it seems to straddle the space between Trad Industrial & the more composed rhythmic stuff. I imagine they use samplers to get these sounds, but wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't the case. "Computergrafik-Pornoshow" is next, again the aquatic voice over a track which phases between sub-dance composition and dissolved noise. "Roboterkrieg" finishes the tape off with a painful white rhythm of sharp ice and honed silver blades, over which the vocals are distant & indistinct. It Burns and freezes, erupts and collapses to it's conclusion.

Although this could be described as an 'uneven' album, they're still capable of surprising you with their noiseworks. This is a tape that grows into grey magnificence.

Originally reviewed for Soft Watch.