a lot of bleak but often majestic landscapes mixed with industrial decay

Hard-edged futursitic techno from Bristol, Uk and Edinburgh, Scotland. Bearing the stamp of 90s Industrial music, the album opener, 'ident', comes on with a synth-riff culled from the trailing edges of Nine Inch Nail's 'Closer', they blend meat combat-boot aggression with Detroit/Berlin's trance-inducing basslines, to suggest the sound of driving through gray pavement and flickering tunnels. Its post-apocalyptic! Its exciting! Its romantic!

Labour Division is the duo's first full-length, after releases on Perc Trax and Stroboscopic Artefacts, and being featured in Surgeon's DJ sets, Forward Strategy Division are primed to be a big deal. This year has seen an upsurge of industrial upstarts, the never-ending onslaught of Dominick Fernow's Vatican Shadow releases, or the recent monolithic Regis re-issues, (one of which i wrote about over here), it seems that ears may be ready to ingest these monochromatic soundscapes. Its not all Blade Runner, though; there's a solid Rave thump to these ten tracks. Its made for dancing, as well as driving. The beats are crisp and sound-sourced from analog. There is a real circuit-board grit to these recordings, that warms the human heart.
Patrick Walker, aka Isodyne, described their intention behind making this records as, 'creating a slightly detached commentary on growing up in Scotland through the 80s and 90s. For me, that would be; confusion, grunge and hard electronics'¦.' in an interview with Halcyonline, before going on to describe FSG's sound as 'glam meets giger'. Its pretty astute, listening to this record is like walking down a concrete tunnel, with industrial sonic bleed receding as you approach the beckoning sub-bass. You open a double-pair of gym doors to a smoky, strobe-lit room.
Forward Strategy Group's stripped-down Technophilia is never going to be a radio hit, although it should. Labour Division, for the most part, is short on melody and full of long-playing locked grooves. Its meant for modern-day trance shamen that like to let the light from the disco ball fall on their slitted eyelids, and dance like cobras. The beat drives you further and further up the spiral, leaving behind all cares and worries, with the grating synth leads scourging away each rising thought like a sandstorm. Mostly its all about the beat, with interludes of dark ambiance, 'Fading Centres,' and clever moments of modern montage, 'Industry & Empires' ' street city atmospherics. Labour Division is like an adventure in an urban jungle, full of chanting and dreams. Its menacing, but at least yr living.
Forward Strategy Group are off to a good start, and show the healthy state of Techno and Bass music across several continents. They continue the trend of assessing and cultivating the strengths of myriad genres, creating a hyper-evolved killing machine. Deadly efficient, and made to thrive. Start here, then dig through the rest of Perc Trax's catalog, read some interviews, and get a good introduction to the post-Industrial underground.