Voltage Black: "Meccano Roses Pt. 1"

Hot on the heels of James May and his prime-time championing of retro-toys, boot fair favourite Meccano looks set for its second big comeback this year. There’s a nice kind of Buddhist anarchy in wiping your Facebook to go and screw small bits of steel together (the first big comeback, ironically, was a big YouTube hit); now London based deck-bender Ewan Fisher is trying to bring about comeback two with his EP Mecanno Roses. Fisher, who calls himself Voltage Black when recording (don’t get fooled by the name—electricians will tell you his sound’s the opposite of neutral cabling), has attempted to cut his love for electro into jagged and grub-screwed foliage, ripping up a storm with this double-stalker as he flits between prospective labels. Instead of opting for the clean breaks of Hyperdub’s electro/analogue crossovers or going sugar-rush 8-bit batshit, the Voltage Black sound is one of twisting, crunching scuzz, peaking and bleeping like a rough weather buoy gone a little too deep and too seasick.

Beginning with the high-voltage hum as is found around pissed-on condensers, “Meccano Roses Pt. 1” thrashes like James May if his makeshift bridge had collapsed, the Mersey spectators free to stone him for all the shit cars he’s exploded. From proto-dubstep foundations, a fingers-on-the-chalkboard key squeal coils along Joker beats, bound in chorusing synth bars that pirate an old Coldplay harmony. Like the toys of the title it builds/breaks/builds/gets hurled against a wall, culminating in a triumphant see-saw payoff more acidic than a mouthful of bon-bons. You might need bolt-croppers to trim Fisher’s flower bed but he grows a spectacular orchid, and if this steel love token is what Voltage Black calls a rose, I’d hate to meet the Venus Flytrap. Be careful around this one, Mr May. It’ll sting you before you can say rugby shirt.