120 Days

citypaper.net EXCLUSIVE: "Come Out (Come Down, Fade Out, Be Gone)"

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Remember 10 years ago when Rolling Stone slapped Prodigy on its cover and proclaimed that this new thing called "electronica" was replacing rock 'n' roll? Yeah, well, there's a reason that never worked out. Although it wasn't as fringe as it might have been in the '70s and '80s, the bulk of the era's techno was still too cold and too clinical to resonate with mass audiences who tend to prefer people to robots. Plus, Keith Flint's bat-ear hairdo was kinda ridiculous. But it got folks thinking, tinkering and figuring out ways to inject some humanity into this mechanical music, something expertly done by Norway's 120 Days on "Come Out (Come Down, Fade Out, Be Gone)." The nine-minute song spans decades, coming off a little bit Kraftwerk, a little bit Future Sound of London. Titillating industrial synthesizers lock into a frenetic loop as echoplex guitar and steam pipe hi-hat noises come, go and re-emerge in the mix. It should just be the same old routine, but it's not. The urgent voice of Adne Meisfjord soon appears to lend the piece a spirit that was lacking a decade ago. "Break down, build up again," he howls. Even as layers of sound swirl around him like a centrifuge, you'll find genuine life amid the circuitry.

You can nab this cut from the generous assortment of MP3s on www.r5productions.com. 120 Days will play at Johnny Brenda's on March 11.