We Love: Youth Code’s “A Place To Stand” EP

We Love is an opportunity for EB writers to contemplate, rant, and rave about one of their current musical obsessions and the deeper issues they inspire. In this installment, Daniel Jones reps the latest EP from LA industrialists Youth Code, out now on Dais.

Industrial music was in a really crummy place for a while. After decades of socially transgressive viciousness, the genre succumbed to toothless jock posturing, rotten with misogynistic lyrics masquerading as post-goth poetry and focused more on neon cyber-wardrobes than aural craftsmanship. Youth Code don’t roll that way. Their thrash-inducing new EP, A Place To Stand, builds on the driving EBM of their self-titled debut and cranks the dosage of scuzzed-out hardcore punk to a mind-melting degree.

From the opening blast of “Consuming Guilt,” the band pummels listeners with brutal beats and vocals that are half-spoken word, half-raw and rusted machine wails. The tracks are imbued with a strong socio-political edge and (surprisingly) a smart synthpop sensibility—provided you like your synthpop shrieked at high volume. Backed up by a selection of strong remixes (my favorite of which is Clipping.’s dubbed-over rap on “Wear The Wounds”), the experience feels far heftier than you’d expect from the average EP. For anyone seeking the best that industrial music has to offer in 2014, A Place To Stand is essential.

Published October 28, 2014. Words by Daniel Jones.