The big-beat electronica guru Junkie XL stays pretty hardcore on Booming Back at You. No problem here cursing and being sexually explicit with some of the lyrics! This set is perfect and ripe for a raunchy night club experience, featuring a plethora of old school noises – clanging cymbals, rattling drum cages, noisy synths. It's obnoxious, but good for "in yer face" clubbing music.
A label debut on a video game-related outfit, the latest "BOOM" features a shameless cover of "Cities in Dust." (purchase/download) The episode takes Siouxsie and the Banshees' goth rock tale of "ancient Pompeii residents being smothered in lava" and turns it into a craze-induced floor-filler with a booming drumbeat and female vocalist yelling exclamatory "yeah!" notes. What's more, a shocking highlight with Rocket on "More" (purchase/download) shocks all when the singer rallies all hedonists with "Rock more/Roll more/F*k more/Pac-Man is loving it."
Musically, Junkie is pretty predictable and also unoriginal (just as a video game music composer should be) as he skillfully brings a world where big beat never died into the modern age where electro and house are so strong still. Exciting Fatboy Slim-inspired floor-fillers rule and are rounded out by a couple of quirky numbers like the weird "Mad Pursuit" and "Zage," which has a hint of a sloppy Kraftwerk. Then, "No Way" provides a shed of light, but is actually about Junkie's video game forefathers with some classic gaming-styled tones. Otherwise there's not much more present, and the rest of the album fades a bit into a hyper caffeine fest. Overall this album didn't kill me, but I know he's done better. No junk.
Released March 11, 2008 on Nettwerk Records