Death Tape Super Bass - Olympus DS-330

 Released: January 30

With Olympus DS-330, Death Tape Super Bass brings us another gritty collection of tracks filled with noise, synths, dirty drums, and some odd selections of found sounds from an unlabeled field recorder. As always, the percussion is what drives a good chunk of the tracks with a combination growling bass hits and crispy fried snares and hats. Meanwhile we also get some entirely synth-driven pieces in between the onslaught of drums, like on “There’s a Whole Market” which is one of the sparsest track here all far as elements present. It’s centered around this piece of a voice recording that is ostensibly saying the title of the song, but it’s looped and mangled in such a way as to be nearly indecipherable and coming across as a bizarre chant that is accompanied by a single heavily distorted synth. It’s effective in pushing the album forward and goes on just long enough to break from the heavy drums that came off of “Don’t Stop,” which positively slams you with those crisp and high gain snare hits. 

There’s a few slower and more muted pieces on here as well, like the later in the album “[unintelligible]” which has that crispy percussion but tones things down considerably. The vocal sample lives up to the name and comes along with a nostalgia-flavored 303 bass line that brings back the acid days of the past in a more low-key presentation. The synths throughout the whole album usually scream out but this is one of the few tracks that takes a more reserved approach to synth work and it feels perfectly spot-on. But some of the other tracks lean into the wilder composition methods, like the insane “Smoking 1.” The synth on this track never stays still, almost like it’s in a constant state of soloing as it veers wildly all over the soundscape while the repetitive drums try to unsuccessfully rein it in. 

The album is just an overall wild bit of fun. It’s not anything serious but it doesn’t really ask you to take it as such. It’s best to just get lost in the noisy foray and maybe light up a smoke if you still have that habit laying around. If not, it’s still a fun ride anyway.