On Halloween of 2018, electronic/industrial duo ENGRAM released their latest album entitled “Das Kapital”. This album certainly makes for an interesting concept as they take their minimalistic nature of the music, and make it somewhat haunting.
Martin Bowes of Attrition and John Costello both draw from many influences to conceptualize “Das Kapital”, which is a follow up to their 2015 release entitled “Karl Marx”. “Das Kapital” is originally a manifesto written by Karl Marx which talks about the exploitation of labor and how technology diminishes the quality of productivity therefore exploiting the workforce. This album takes on that concept and combines it with the state of the world and makes it a haunting tale.
The beauty of “Das Kapital” is that nothing is overdone. The music and electronic undertones certainly tell the story. The story starts off with a somewhat light yet haunting track entitled “Divine Plan”, which seems to talk about how politicians and various leaders of the world look at themselves as “divine rulers” chosen by God or whatever they perceive as their higher power. “The Good Life” has amazing voiceovers, with the lyric, “if we can’t live indeed, then we must die indeed”. It definitely has a Georgio Marauder influence in this track.
This album sounds ominous overall and it comes to a dark crashing halt to bring about the sinister plot of politicians due to exploitation in the final track “Exquisite Corpse”. Engram is probably the best electronic/industrial artist that you might have overlooked. They know how to take a historic manifesto and are able to have the manifesto come to life with their meticulous yet succinct ways of arranging the music. Engram makes this music into an art form as Madness To Creation gives “Das Kapital” a 9 out of 10 stars. Here is the track listing:
- Divine Plan
- Karl Marx
- The Good Life
- Highgate Part 2
- The Razor Inside
- Law of Betrayal
- Hi Teikai No
- What Am I?
- Point of No Return
- Eyn irren tot
- Exquisite Corpse
Fans can find ENGRAM at the following locations:
www.engrammusik.bandcamp.com/album/das-kapital
Das Kapital is a little long to be called a manifesto…