RetConStruct- Dear Doomsday

Artist: RetConStruct

CD Title: Dear Doomsday

Label: Engraved Ritual

Genre:  EBM/electronica/noise

Hailing from San Jose, the husband and wife duo of Guy Valdes (Composer, Producer) and Jill Valdes (Lyrics, Vocals, Art) make up the sonic boomers that is RetConStruct.

RetConStruct first entered into the scene in early October of 2012 on the Juggernaut Services compilation Moving Mountains. Two of their tracks were featured "All Gone Awry " and "The Maelstrom ". Both tracks would later appear on their debut CD Dear Doomsday released in late February 2012 on their new label Engraved Ritual. In December of 2012, they appeared on the Engraved Ritual compilation " Hate Is A Weapon" amongst many other notable peers like Say Just Words, God Destruction, Bleeding Corp. and Traumatize just to name a few. If Einstürzende Neubauten were to team up with Throbbing Gristle and then have a baby with Sigue Sigue Sputnik, this might be the deformed love child of that sinister offspring. Quite simply, it is an all out electro-noise assult on both the ears and the senses. The best way to describe their rather "unique" sound is a combination of dubstep and breakbeat with a splattering of harsh EBM with a punk sensibility. If you take all of these eclectic elements and throw them in a blender with a heapin' helping of pure techno noise, you would get a creative and beautiful accident. I was less than impressed with this duo's debut Dear Doomsday, as I found myself cringing and wincing in pain throughout most of the album. Though your ears do get a small break from time to time, it quite frankly feels like getting repeatedly raped by a gang of killer machines ( and not in a good way). Jill's voice is not pleasant to the ear. It seems to wobble back and forth between robotic punk and Courtney Love (Hole). The only thing that made this album less unbearable was the harsh EBM remix of "Infernus" by Kristof Bathory (Dawn of Ashes). I think this album desperately needed more remixes other than just the one to give it more equilibrium. I would not just simply chalk it all up to noise or powernoise, it seems that there is indeeded some organization to their chaos and a method to their madness.

I have a feeling that RetConStruct would find a bigger audience in the live performance art scene. Dear Doomsday is not a record you'd want to have to sit and listen to at home or on your Ipod. I think they have a message and the message isn't something you can just simply listen to, it is something you have to experience. I personally would not ever wish to "experience" a techno assult like this again. However, if they had a cool, live performance art show, I might be inclined to go and bring my earplugs, because if Dear Doomsday is any indication..there will be noise!

Take a Listen to Retconstruct- Dear Doomsday