Permanent: Hunger Or Nausea 12″

Description

Branching out from the bedroom synth of their debut, 2021’s ‘Social Disease’, Durham, North Carolina’s Mimi Luse moves her Permanent moniker more toward more distorted and sample heavy, rhythmically complex clanging industrial-tinged take on DIY basement techno complete with a final track based around a sample made from a melted Janet Jackson record. A migration that was alluded to previously but goes straight for the throat here. A deliciously deviant collection of overdriven beats and tormented sound design.

Our take: By the time Sorry State released Cochonnes Emergency 12 in the fall of 2021, the band had split, but Cochonnes singer / songwriter / bassist Mimi Luse had already moved on to her next project, Permanent. Our part of North Carolina has always had a lot of cross-pollination between the underground punk and electronic / noise scenes (both of which found a home at the Nightlight club in Chapel Hill), and Mimis transition from Cochonne to the electronic project Permanent is a perfect example of the magic that can happen when those two worlds meet. Im no scholar of electronic music subgenres, but Ive heard Permanents music described as industrial techno. That term makes perfect sense to me because, texturally, Permanents music sounds like its grounded in the late 80s / early 90s Chicago / Wax Trax / industrial scene, with pounding, punk-inspired rhythm tracks, synths and electronics that tend toward the noisy and distorted, and clipped samples that lend the music a fractured cyberpunk vibe (the vocal sample that says jack of diamonds in that track even sounds a little like Steve Albini from Big Black). However, Permanent doesnt rely on the pop-oriented structures I associate with the Wax Trax scene, but something more like techno, with overlapping motifs tracks shifting with the subtle power of tectonic plates, revealing compelling cycles of tension and release for those who listen past the relentless thump that confronts you on first listen. Ive seen Permanent play live a bunch of times and the room is always bumping, and that energy and power are captured beautifully on this 12. The packaging and presentation are also totally punk, a small-batch pressing (100 numbered copies) with a screen printed foldover cover. Not Sorry States usual fare, but it hits just as hard.