French three-piece Veik have released ‘Difficult Machinery’, the first single taken from their debut LP Surrounding Structures, set for release 30 April on Fuzz Club Records.
Centred around vintage analogue synths and abrasive instrumentation, the band’s experimental post-punk is rooted in the 70s avant-garde, most notably Krautrock and No Wave. They reel off groups like Implog, Suicide or Indoor Life as inspirations, whilst existing in a similar world to contemporaries like Beak>, Suuns and Girl Band.
The LP arrives off the back of a handful of EPs and singles, tours around Europe and shows with the likes of The Soft Moon, Tomaga and Vanishing Twin. Talking about the album, they say that “The writing of Surrounding Structures was heavily influenced by architectural environments. We made a lot of detours when touring in 2017 and 2018 to visit modernist and brutalist buildings in France, Germany and Belgium (which caused us many delays for soundchecks.)”
‘Difficult Machinery’ opens with a detached proto-punk drone, very Faust by way of The Velvet Underground. It takes traditional krautrock tendencies and gives them new life, with added vocals to mix things up. Vocalist/drummer Boris Collet explains that the lyrics came to him watching his dad ill in a hospital bed: “Seeing him weakened and plugged into banks of machines through cables that radiated from his body was a weird experience. This concept of ‘difficult machinery’ made sense to emphasise the mind-body dualism through the metaphor of the body as a machine.”
It’s a tantalising taste of what’s to come from the LP and leaves us with bated breathe.
Pre-order here
