When Blxpltn hit the scene in 2013, it was like an angry mob had flipped over a police car and set it ablaze. That boiled over on 2015 LP bow Black Cop Down, which despite the incorporation of electronic elements, was a dyed-in-the-denim punk album – righteous celebration of revolutionary anger.
Now a duo of vowel-adverse anarchists, Jonathan Horstmann and Taszlin Muerte unload the first single from their upcoming sophomore album, New York Fascist Week. “FEMA” blows in a hurricane of warped raps about a displaced and disenfranchised individual drowning in sorrow because they’ve been screwed by the government.
“New York Fascist Week doesn’t really sound like Black Cop Down,” offers Muerte. “There are some nods to our punk roots, but this is the way our sound is evolving with the instruments we’re using and the influences we’ve had.
“The last album was already written for the most part when we got into the studio,” the vocalist/percussionist continues. “This album was written more in the studio with our producers Autry Fulbright […And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead] and Elliott Frazier [Ringo Deathstarr], who also worked on the last record. We messed around with different instruments and samples much more than on the first record.”
Multi-instrumentalist/singer Jonathan Horstmann says it’s a wide range of influences that culminate on New York Fascist Week.
“We’re releasing ‘FEMA’ to show just how much the sound has grown, but some of the other tracks are even faster and harder than the last album,” he says. “If Black Cop Down was an angsty teen, then New York Fascist Week is a pissed-off young adult, with more knowledge, freedom, and resources.”
Napalm-throated guitarist Khattie Q exiting the group last year was a catalyst for Blxpltn to revise their sound.
“Khattie left the band last April, just as we went into the studio to begin writing and recording. That left Tasz and myself to not only see what we could do together collaboratively, but to ‘roll tape’ whenever we did,” explains Horstmann. “What came out of it was some pretty dope collaborations on tracks we were holding on to. Sometimes you don’t know if a song idea is your sound and then something happens like a band member leaving and you say, ‘Fuck it,’ and you just start throwing all your ideas out there. Then you surround yourself with people that you trust to help you carve something unique and powerful out of the swirl of noise in your heads.
“New York Fascist Week is a testament to that process. The album is eclectic for sure, and we’re complex people, but this band and this sound has never been more Blxpltn than it is right now.”
New York Fascist Week arrives in August on local imprint Wolfshield Records. Catch Blxpltn Sunday at the Grand with Ex-Legionnaires.
This article appears in April 15 • 2016.