heatsick: re-engineering

Re-Engineering is the bold new album from Heatsick, aka Berlin-based British artist Steven Warwick. Well-known for his epic multi-hour live club sets and acerbic wit, he characterizes this collection of new material as a "cybernetic poem" that both indulges us in the mores of hypnotic dance music while holding a critical, and at times satirical, lens toward the culture writ large. The opening title-track is symbolic of this balance, the crisp spoken-word poetry communicating hyper-modernity in crisis in a piece that equally evokes the masked humor of Chic and the biting surreal-ity of Chris Morris. "Modern life is still rubbish you say. Modern rubbish is still life." The tracks "Mimosa" and "Speculative" play with a similar conflict, warping the themes of modern luxury familiar to Malcolm McLaren's seminal Paris album, and delivering rare vocal lines that convey distance and a degree of uneasiness. The masterful club tracks that constitute the bulk of this album feel all the more powerful and honest when framed in this hyper-aware context, confirming the underlying inclusiveness in Warwick's music and perspective. We dance together, we crash together.