Recommended for fans of: Nine Inch Nails, Deftones, Death Grips, Godflesh, clipping.
The thing about blending genres is – just like mixing together too many shades of paint – what you often end up with is just… beige.
But when you get it right, not just sloppily blending together all the most generic and familiar aspects of different styles but relying on the clashing, kaleidoscopic contrasts between them to create something weird and provocative that smashes through all the established boundaries… that’s when you get Doodseskader.
And with their third album set for release on Friday, now seemed like the perfect time to shine some light on the duo’s unique amalgam of Electro-Industrial-Hip-Hop and Nu-Punk-Sludge-Metal.
2022 – YEAR ONE
If this is your first time hearing Doodseskader, then you should be ready to expect the unexpected… as the sludgy Post-Metal via punky Nu-Metal intensity of “1745” quickly demonstrates.
The screaming, squalling, shuddering, Deftones-meets-Death Grips-meets-Aphex Twin assault of “Bloemen Noch Kransen” – humongous, down-tuned guitars blended with hammering, industrial beats and juddering, jarring rhythms – takes the album in an even heavier direction, while the morbidly anthemic, Nine Inch Nails-influenced “It’s Not An Addiction If You Don’t Feel Like Quitting” goes for a more cruelly catchy, miserably melodic vibe that contrasts nicely with the more blunt-force-trauma approach of its predecessor.
“Less of Everything” (which, despite its title, actually defies the suggestion that “less is more”) pushes the classic quiet/loud dynamic to its breaking point, juxtaposing brooding calm with bombastic catharsis in a manner that once again draws comparison with the Deftones, after which the visceral, distorted vocals and sludgy, low-and-slow, stop-start grooves of the Atari Teenage Riot-esque “Alive & Not Well” take the album in a darker, more ominous direction that – spoiler alert – acts as an early hint of where things might just go next.
Before that, of course, there’s the weirdly experimental – almost avant-garde, even – merging of metallic punk and electro-ambience of “I Hope You Find Joy In Your Ignorance” and the stagger ‘n’ swagger, simmer ‘n’ shimmer of “Blood Feud” (imagine Amenra crossed with Portishead and you’ll be in the right sort of ball-park) to get through, both of which help establish Doodseskader as a band definitely playing by their own rules!
2024 – YEAR TWO
Doodseskader‘s second album, Year Two, was one of my favourite albums of 2024… and with good reason.
Heavier, hookier, and more unpredictable than ever, marrying an even more massive sense of guitar-heavy groove with an extra helping of dälek/clipping./Run The Jewels style sonic swagger, plus some increasingly sneering, snotty lyrical nihilism and venom-spitting vocal aggression, songs like the prowling, pulsating, punishingly heavy “Pastel Prison” and the Ministry-meets-Meshuggah-meets-Massive Attack mash-up of “The Sheer Horror of the Human Condition” push the band’s gene-splicing, genre-blending sound even further.
Equal parts dance-floor-filler and mosh-pit-killer, the ultra-low, bass-heavy grooves of “Innocence (An Offering)” and the Industrial/Hardcore/Hip-Hop cross-breed that is “Bone Pipe” are both perfect examples of just how much darker and nastier Year Two is when compared to Year One, but that’s not to say that the band’s new abum is a one-note affair by any means, especially taking into account the hauntingly hypnotic Trip-Hop pulse of “Peine” which provides a much-needed mid-album break from all the in-your-face auditory ultra-violence.
“Future Perfect (A Promise)” then combines misleadingly moody minimalism with ear-shattering maximalism that will push your speakers close to meltdown, while the cynical melodies and sadistic grooves of “Secrets Make Lonely” feel like a hitherto unheard collaboration between Nine Inch Nails and Neurosis, after which penultimate aggro-anthem “I Ask With My Mouth, I’ll Take With My Fist” – with its eerily infectious chorus refrain of “Seems like you take me for what I am not / If you take me for granted, better get lost” – comes across like a grungier, punkier version of Godflesh as seen through a twisted, post-millennial, Post-Metal prism.
And then there’s the album’s brooding finale “People Have Poisoned My Mind To A Point Where I Can No Longer Function”, whose pulsing electronic rhythms and ominous, oppressive synths fully put to bed any suggestion that Doodseskader have any limits on what they’re willing, or able, to do with their sound.
2026 – THE CHANGE IS ME
Doodseskader, obviously, are a band who never like to repeat themselves, so it shouldn’t surprise you that The Change Is Me zigs where other bands would probably zag, with cipping.-esque opener “Glass Mask On” highlighting a shift towards a more electronic and synth-heavy, but still intensely abrasive, sound that leans more towards Hardcore… but the EDM version, rather than the Punk one (though the duo are still plenty punky).
A vicious indictment of modern day influencer culture and monetised self-loathing (replete with lines like “You’re a subscriber to a shit for brains / Big house, big car and poor fucking taste“) “Celebrity Culture Simp Farm” is a cyberpunk style clash between Metal, Dance, Punk, and Hip-Hop reminiscent (to my ears at least) of the Mad Capsule Markets, while the simmering synthetic pulse of “Please Just Make It Stop” feels more inspired by the likes of Tricky and DJ Shadow than anything from the Metal side of the scene.
Things get even more sinister on “No Laughter Left In Me” (sample lyric: “Please unmake me of the thing I’ve become / Please unmake me, I swear I’m done) which goes all-in on the Alt/Punk Hip Hop vibes, sitting somewhere between the French scene (especially acts like Kaaris and the seminal Suprême NTM) and the Industrial Rap of American artists like dälek and Death Grips (both names which the eagle-eyed among you will have already seen mentioned more than once in this article), after which the bleakly melodic “Weaponizing My Failures” leans more into chilled-out, trip-hoppy, Post Metal-y vibes.
The band stick to their eletro-ambient side on “Unthinking My Every Thought” (one of the most introspective tracks of their career), but bring back the hefty, heaving guitars during “Insignificant Other”, which contrasts soothing melody and brooding atmosphere with bruising intensity, before injecting some unexpected dubstep deviance into the seductively self-destructive strains of dance-floor-ready anthem “It Keeps On Stinging” (“Welcome to hell on earth / It’s a fucking celebration / Get your money’s worth / It’s all out there for the taking“).
Obviously The Change Is Me is the least “Metal” album of the band’s career, but the band’s pivot to the more heavily EDM/Electro influenced sound hasn’t robbed them of their impact or their attitude, as while “I Took a Pill in Vilvoorde” definitely sounds more like it belongs at a rave than a rock show, the insistent refrain of “We’re just beggars at your doorstep” demonstrates that although their style may have changed, their substance definitely hasn’t… plus, as demonstrated by cathartic closer “Suffering in Technicolor” they can still crank up the distortion, and the aggression, when they want to!