Antiform - City In Exile

Rating:

* * *

The debut album,

City In Exile

, is from New Zealand breaks-cum-drum'n'bass destroyers Antiform.

To be fair, Antiform is more than just drum'n'bass, and they ride the genre's pulsing gauntlet to the point where they almost become a rock band.

There's the industrial-dance crunch of

Fight It Out

,

Turn It Up

is a Jilted Generation-era Prodigy concoction of electronic rock, and the Linkin Park drum'n'bass of

Bury Me

has all the subtlety of fellow Australian electronic bogans Pendulum.

Still, if you like Pendulum then you'll like Antiform. The energy and vigour of

City In Exile

can't be faulted - it'll wear you out - but the thing is, at times, rather than stealing the best of retro and making it their own it just sounds a little dated.

Anitform are at their best when they stick to their roots on the rolling Shapeshifter-style drum'n'bass of

Crash

(to which you could dance all night) and the bass-plumbing smoothness of

Artificial Intelligence

with Agent Alvin.

Scott Kara