Review: THYX - 'Below The City'

THYX

‘Below The City’

DREAMWEB MUSIC / METROPOLIS RECORDS

A new letter of dream-weaving tones of alternative electronica. Hidden in the suburbs of Vienna lives THYX, the ascending side project from the creators of Mind.in.a.Box. This is the second album in just a year. ‘The Way Home’ opened up a more vocal side to Stefan Poiss and has continued.

'Searching' is the opening paragraph of the script. A drum pulse opens the door onto the road, and within seconds an electronic wave is pushing down onto the pedal, and floating you away into the evening. The beat is fast and the frequencies already start electrocuting you into the night-time storm.

After burning rubber and getting out of the city, you shift the gear up and ease the throttle onto the autobahn and start ‘The Endless Journey’. A sudden dimness of light can be seen coming into the back view mirror as you sway off the road and hide from the ‘Network of Light’.

At the third composition you realise that with THYX, there is a lot more band, and a slight reduction in computerisation, though with the clashing of frequencies you are left in a slight confusion. This resulted in one needing to go back through the music library to contrast the two projects, as you look for difference in DNA.

The energy is a lot more raw, and this is highly visible in ‘The Street’. The engine is refuelled and you are coming to the outskirts of the next city. The neon road lights shine off the windscreen as the power flows into direct clinging melancholy. But as you gaze at the turn off, you hit the gas pedal and stick to the road with the  pulse of ‘Hate’.

As the night starts seeing the pinnacle before dawn again, the engine sighs as you open the window to feel the wind against the rhythm of ‘Alien Love', and the remark of ‘Roses’ in guitar force. “Below the City” brings the force of strings into the chamber of hope that Stefan Poiss rattles towards the horizon.

The dawn has greeted the wind-shield, as it shines off your hands that grip the steering wheel. The closing notes fall in beat, but the road is not over with ‘Timeless’. The search for a rest stop in the nearby town is made as the thunder beat tells you sleep is necessary. The pulse burns up the last rhythm in an instrumental electronic shutdown (regardless of the voice it is instrumental!).

THYX is still a machine, a “more than human” creation, hidden within the dream-web of what came from Mind.in.a.Box. Gone are the light electronic voice cords and now an exoskeleton of steel with synthetic tissue enlaced. The power of past is still made amongst lightning yells that ripple the skins surface; but these echo with 64 and not 32.

Review by Dominic Lynch (DJ LX-E)

Posted in: below the city,Mind.in.a.box,music,THYX