2020's
Shadow of Fear
marked the studio return of
Cabaret Voltaire
, six years after
Richard H. Kirk
had resurrected the project for live performances and 26 years since their previous album,
The Conversation
, was released. Despite the lengthy absence,
Kirk
has always kept up a prolific, multi-monikered release schedule comparable to peers like
Uwe Schmidt
and
Pete Namlook
, so it's no surprise that three more
CV
releases were announced soon after the album appeared.
Shadow of Funk
concentrates squarely on
's industrial dance side, with three hypnotic, beat-heavy tracks clearly structured for club use. The title track stretches past 12 minutes, featuring a big, clunky drum loop similar to late-'90s tribal techno, building up to aggressive snare rushes and pausing for polyrhythmic breakdowns, while furious noises screech around the insistent beats. The ten-minute "Skinwalker" is a variation on the previous track's theme, employing the same percussion loop and snare rolls but differing in its usage of sampled vocal cries, which are punched in call-and-response style. "Billion Dollar" has a bit of the agitated edge of the first two tracks, particularly with its buzzing sequences, rough breakbeats, and gritty samples, but its bassline and Ibiza-tinged melodies strangely but amusingly approximate a lo-fi version of end-of-the-millennium trance, like a bedroom demo by an aspiring
Paul van Dyk
wannabe. The tracks all sound live and hand-shaped in real time rather than programmed, yet highly focused and direct, and the energy level never lapses. ~ Paul Simpson