Album Review: Kode 9 and the Spaceape, Black Sun

Kode 9. Photo / Supplied

As a musician, DJ, and owner of record label Hyperdub, Kode 9 (real name Steve Goodman) from Glasgow was one of the pioneers of the dubstep scene in the early 2000s.

His album with collaborator Space Ape in 2006, the excellent Memories of the Future, was at the forefront of dubstep's lurch out of the murk towards the mainstream. And though Black Sun is just as innovative and intriguing as it glitches, writhes, and, scuttles from the speakers, it doesn't quite have the same all-powerful intensity.

Though that could possibly have more to do with the proliferation of dubstep as a genre than Kode 9's music-making.

If anything it's far more diverse, and while the predominance of dubstep looms large, a track like Love is the Drug has a spring in its step, and it even starts bopping along with the oonst-driven beats of Black Sun (Partial Eclipse Version).

The most unnerving moment is saved for last on Kryon, which is the sort of beautifully sick, scary sound you'd expect from a collaboration between Kode 9 and twisted musical genius Flying Lotus.

As for Spaceape, if you go on his voice alone he's not the sort of character you'd want to meet in a dark alley. He casts a foreboding presence with his spooky rhetoric and conjures up a menacing mood on Am I with his recurring line "I cut straight through the middle like a surgical knife".

Stars: 3.5/5
Verdict: No longer pioneering, but still menacing
Buy Black Sun

- TimeOut