Keser - Robo_Ghost

If Martin Hannett had lived to see 2009, I’m sure he’d have loved to produce an album like Robo_Ghost. As it happens, Keser have done a pretty good job without him. The dub-eyed urban soundscapes that Hannett unleashed with Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures are translated in the modern vernacular; on 3 Point Play (Set Piece), robotic beats are pumped out of drum machines rather than kits, whilst blasts of white noise replace boxy punk power chords. Amongst this post-rock ambience, however, there’s a track with enough pop appeal that it seems oddly bereft of a lead vocal: the deceivingly daft-titled Acts of Dog. Starting out like an early U2 ballad, the song is soon blitzed by a bombing raid of dangerously dirgy guitars before succumbing to a blissful fadeout. It's a collection so image-laden that it dares you to write a dystopian movie screenplay, just so it can provide the soundtrack. [Joe Barton]