Squarepusher: Damogen Furies review – wave after wave of brutal beats

During the past decade, Squarepusher – alias Essex-born Tom Jenkinson – has made his own instruments, hardware and software that allows him to record a track in one take, rather than carefully selecting samples and painstakingly editing them together. Damogen Furies is a commendable attempt to showcase his improvisational dexterity and capture the spontaneity of his live shows. This innovative way of working hasn’t affected Squarepusher’s power to shock and awe with wave after wave of brutal beats – though it hasn’t necessarily given his music any more heart. That said, Stor Eiglass (all the song titles are in nonsense-language) has a gorgeous descending melody that wouldn’t sound out of place in the chorus of an 80s electropop song. Squarepusher’s predilection for proggy jazz noodling is given free rein on Kontenjaz and Baltang Arg, while the slower Exjag Nives starts like a John Carpenter score before the eerie feel is buried under an avalanche of drills and bleeps.