Paula Temple – Colonized

Label: R&S

While some many not be familiar with the name of Paula Temple, the self-described 'noisician' is no newcomer to the music scene. Although she has released nothing under her own name since 2002’s Speck of the Future on the Materials label, Temple has been working with both music and technology, delving further into various strains of noise. For her first R&S release, Temple surprisingly becomes the label's first female signing in history, bringing a brutal EP of metallic techno, drawing on industrial and noise tropes to unsettling, bewitching effect.

The raw violence of these tracks may be too much for some, but look deeper to uncover an artist who challenges conventional structure and form with great success. Lead track Colonized is the most aggressive of the bunch, dealing in metal-on-metal beat patterns and alarming synth tones. The second original cut on wax is Cloned, an equally impressive take that leads with searing synths and tough broken beats, eroded away to nothing, anticipating the moody entry of a towering scifi wash. The package is rounded off by the most disorientating cut of all, the digital-only Decolonization, where the opener’s core elements are chopped into an unpredictable assault of vicious rhythms, rounded off by a quasi-mystical vocal breakdown and a stunning final sequence where Temple clips the loops ever shorter, digitally disintegrating the music into a frightening electronic mulch.

The reliable Perc takes over remix duties, adding aqueous synths to a straightened-out Colonized on the Bubble Mix. However it’s his interpretation on the Metal Mix which really demands attention, a stomping industrial rework which turns the original’s drones into jarring staccato interruptions, to particularly striking effect on the masterful breakdown at the 4-minute mark. While listeners will at first be drawn in by the raw viscerality of Temple’s constructions, it is her defiant approach to structure and her destructive attitude towards her own music which lend them staying power. As a whole Colonized stands as a strikingly different and disturbingly compelling package.

7.5/10