‘Regress, Stretched thin across a broken frame, Regress, We wager dreams in a rigged game, Is there anything more than just to survive?’ (Progress)

Hailing from Raleigh, North Carolina, and featuring members of Voight Kampf and Skemäta, DE()T return with a 7-inch follow up to their 2024 debut album, Think Of Your Future.  They continue to revel in fashioning disconcertingly jolting, off kilter post-punk.  Shards of guitar are interwoven with spaced out swells of synth, underpinned by chunky bass lines, and burlier than anticipated percussion.

Meanwhile, the laconically drawled vocals hover somewhere between mischievous and disdainful detachment.  They are born of that moment when you realise that your more youthful optimism may have been misplaced and that things don’t necessarily have to get better.  In fact, the converse is often more likely to be true.  These satisfyingly offbeat charms land with particular relish on the infectiously despondent Progress and the assertively pulsing title track.