Following up on last year’s deep and slowly unfolding career-peak MONAD XVI, mysterious techno luminary RROSE takes a new approach and comes out guns blazing on the three-song Eating the Other EP. Leadoff track “Pentagons” wastes no time in deploying a propulsive stereo panned four-on-the-floor kick which doesn’t let up for a moment. It’s a big tune, expertly designed for a big club system. “Ammonia” features a slower build and a less frantic tempo, but is no less intense once it reaches its full cruising altitude. Some very sci-fi synth effects are deployed, sounds like bubbling beaker tubes and steaming contraptions of indeterminate purpose. 11-minute closing track “Mirror” takes up the entire second side. It’s dubby minimal techno at its finest, all swirls of static and pulsing low-end, crafting long builds into sustained plateaus of rugged sonic architecture with the addition of some rattling hi-hats and mid-range stabs and nary a melodic element to be found.

Eating the Other doesn’t break much with the standard techno 12″ format, which is fine by me. The art of finding novel forms of expression within a relatively rigid structural framework lies at the heart of any number of genres, from hardcore punk to bluegrass. RROSE is an expert at using an almost archetypal structure in ways that are engaging and playful. What more can you ask for?

Eating the Other is available now from Eaux