Artist: Das Ich

Album: “Alter Ego”

Release Date: July 10, 2007

Label: Metropolis

Availability: CD, Ruckus

Das Ich may well be the most authentically Gothic electronic band performing today. With their origins in the original heyday of the Goth movement, their Freudian references (including their name), and the fact that they’re always singing in German, they embody, rather than just emulate, the core concepts of dark electronica.

The instrumentation sounds a lot like VNV Nation’s earlier work – dark, unpolished, and a little primitive. The shrieked German vocals take the sound further in that direction – this is a dark, clanky, somewhat frightening record that is still quite danceable.

In fact, the whole record, while composed of new songs, sounds like it could have been released in the 1980s. This isn’t a criticism – Das Ich is sticking with a sound that’s been largely abandoned since then, playing industrial noise without dressing it up too much.

This album isn’t for everyone – the oppressiveness of the beats never really lets up, even for the brief moments of beauty on tracks like “Unschuld Erde,” – but if you’re at all inclined toward industrial, EBM or Gothic music, you should pick this up.