Pictureplane: Technomancer

The world that these songs on exist in, as Pictureplane’s Travis Egedy sings to us, is a dead one (where, of course, people get it on in the ruins of a shopping mall). The arrangements on Technomancer frequently play like droning or piercing alarms, particularly on tracks like “Sick Machine” and “Death Condition,” the latter of which is laden with clunky, mechanical percussion that makes it sound like a vintage video game. Whereas Pictureplane’s 2011 record Thee Physical spun queer and cyborg theory into fuzzy house-inspired electronica, Technomancer plays like a soundtrack to a sci-fi dystopian film. It works well as a concept record about trying to break out of one’s oppressive urban regime, with Egedy weaving his whispery conspiracy theories into every track.

But while Pictureplane’s signature ’90s-evoking female vocal samples might sing soulfully in the distance, the record feels drained of the energy his previous albums showcased. The common setting on Techomancer is slowmo, with most tracks favoring ethereal, romantic ’80s synths over the pumped up, choppy compositions on Thee Physical. Even the breakbeat intro on “Harsh Realm” cuts out a minute in, favoring a more chilled out, awkward see-saw synth progression before returning to the sound of the song’s start. The blaring airhorns and record scratching sounds on “Street Pressure” feel like they’re working against the soft, sultry melody Egedy builds on that song, like a jokey nod to traditional club music. All of this seems at odds with the sound Pictureplane has cultivated thus far. There’s a tame, almost downtempo vibe to a lot of this record that keeps it from beginning to end in a sluggish, not very dance-friendly territory.

Technomancer is certainly Egedy’s most nicely produced output yet, with his voice coming through stronger than ever on a lot of these songs. “Crack all the windows downtown, it’s that new American noise,” he sings to a “renegade street trash” on the more traditional, radio-friendly pop track “Riot Porn.” But the noise of Technomancer just plays too comfortably. Technomancer is very high concept in its man vs. machine dystopian themes, but the darkwave-edged beats Egedy constructs, while bleak, don’t possess the same level of imagination. In seemingly trying to make more cinematic and visionary electronica he ends up making pretty lackluster, slow-burning pop. On Technomancer Egedy’s typically wire-frayed, wall-of-sound ’90s mixtape sound feels stripped into something more pedestrian rather than futuristic.