DIAG004 — Shit and Shine — B1 Shower Curtain by DIAGONAL

DIAG004 — SHIT AND SHINE — EP + DIGITAL

Shit & Shine's architect, Craig Clouse, has spent the past decade amassing a reputation for remarkable live shows — churning slabs of repetitive, transcendentally intense rhythmic noise, frequently featuring multiple drummers — as well as a string of caustic albums via Riot Season whose stark, minimalist constructions simultaneously draw energy from noise rock, post-industrial musics and proto-techno.

Following last year's Jream Baby Jream album, the new EP for Diagonal presents a slight shift from previous form. A suite of brutally degraded but infectiously funky rhythm-driven tracks and corrosive re-edits, it finds Clouse turning his gaze, obliquely but with intense clarity of vision, towards the dancefloor. Its four tracks take a dry and percussive but distinctly playful approach, bringing them into alignment with the gutted dance-not-dance of Diagonal boss Powell.

Lead track 'Blowhannon' draws out the latent propulsion of much of Clouse's earlier work into sleaze-ridden and chaotic funk. He uses its infectious, undulating bassline as launch-off point towards alien territory, shattering apart its vocals, percussion and spiky guitars in a haze of effects. The clustered drum machine hits and convulsive keys in ‘Value’ erupt in showers of distortion, while 'Shower Curtain' casts brittle, noisy punk-funk in sand-blasted monochrome. The final track, a re-edit of Theo Parrish's 'Synthetic Flemm', lays bare its rough-cut, deconstructionist aesthetic. Playing like Parrish's original with all its synapses fried through lysergic overload, like the rest of the EP it's at once forbidding, darkly humourous and irresistibly psychedelic.

The EP was released in September, 2013, on 12" vinyl and digital download formats. The vinyl issue comes in an LP sleeve with double hits of high-vis yellow and pornographic pink. The release also marks the first collaboration with artist and designer Guy Featherstone, who heads up Design at Wieden and Kennedy, London.