Belgian visual artist and musician based out of Mechelen, Enzo Kreft, alias of Eric Vandamme, was integral part the European underground crop of DIY experimentalists that, in the late 70s/80s, released very small batches of tape or vinyl, characterized by that lo-fi dark synth sound, made exclusively with analog synthesizers and drum machines, later dubbed ‘minimal synth/wave’ and brought to light in the new millennium by infamous compilations like Veronica Vasicka’s “Minimal Wave Tapes”.
If the themes from first two Enzo’s highly collectable 1983/84 cassettes “Me Is”, featuring his best-known tracks “Beauty Queen”, “Erotic Fantaseesz”, and “Cicatrice”, through his own Zak label, already evoked images of an apocalyptic society, little seems to have changed, just updated to our nowadays most technological and dangerous time, for the second single, entitled “Connected”, taken from the forthcoming sixth full-length “Control” due to be released on June 15 via Wool-E Discs.
At first, humming turns to monotonous droning pulsating bass line interspersed with menacing and obsessive, alarming synth riffs and hypnotic beats, impressing a hopeless sense of claustrophobia and distress embued by robotic, detached, sparsely drone-like, vocals haunted by oppression and fear.
Buried and imprisoned in a modern-day dystopia, hopelessly isolated, exposed, brainwashed and seamlessly ‘connected’, while ‘Big Brother’ is lurking just behind the matrix.
Keep up with Enzo Kreft: