Ritualz

Ritualz

I began my evening by checking in with RITUALZ, the Mexico City electro-wunderkind who seems to be distancing himself from the †‡† symbol-name that he emerged as. Likewise, he seems to be shedding his air of mystery, correctly confident that the dark majesty of his music, bereft of the trappings of what used to be dubbed “witch house”, will suffice in conveying his message. Last night, he bludgeoned a respectable crowd at an East Austin dive bar with his trademark synth-stabs and treated vocals, mixing pure pop, 90s rave, industrial clang and a metal lover’s obsession with noise and chaos. It’s funny: having seen Skrillex play to an infinitely larger crowd the other night, I could see Ritualz being just as effective in the same setting if hype and expectation ever caught up to the noise that Ritualz comes up with. - The Boston Phoenix

Like a Baksy for synthpop, Ritualz (aka the symbol †‡† aka rrritualzzz) is a faceless enigma from Mexico City who has been turning heads for the last couple of years with the remarkably unique sound of “Witch House,” a genre that blends shoegaze, techno, Houston chopped & screwed, mid-‘90s rave music, and goth. The result is a sensual, dark, borderline-metal style that creeps the audience out while making it want to dance. The genre is also known as “Haunted House,” which is extremely well-fitted to the dynamic, ethereal experience it provides. Ritualz’s fourth album Hypermotion X is another serving of his delectable inferno reducing a great deal of the hard-smashing dance beats from his earlier works, leaving behind an all-absorbing cluster of raw emotion and experimental passion.

Hypermotion X opens to the aptly named “Meditate:” a set of spooky, echoing keyboard shrieks that accompany a slow and distant bass rumble. The track’s lingering and ghostly notes make it sound as if it’s being played out of one jumbo amplifier in an abandoned subway tunnel. It fades out to “Limerance,” which rip the album open with a rotating ball of guitar feedback accompanied by distorted drums, stabbing high notes, a minimalist guitar chorus, and a highly distorted vocal track featuring partially intelligible lyrics.

The intriguing tone set by “Limerance,” gets passed along to the even more fast moving “Alien,” which showcases a chorus replete with elements from early ‘90s rave mixes. Another heavily distorted, highly emotive, and almost evil sounding vocal track plays in the valleys between the glittering synth peaks and restless snare beats. It follows through to its reverberating end, welcoming the all-too-soon final track, “Rhythmic Release,” offering the most satisfying four minutes of the album’s twelve. “Rhythmic Release,” is an instantly enjoyable epic sounding like a supernatural Technotronic remix with quadruple the sex appeal. The relaxed beat moves with austere synthesizer hooks; punctuating the heavenly reverberating vocals that shift from female, to male, to demonic with the repetition of the lyric “hear me now.” The song breaks down into an electronic lightning storm of colorful high notes at the end, closing the album just as it becomes truly mesmerizing.

Ritualz has had a short, but interesting career producing slick dance beats that blend the techno workings of the last twenty years of electronic music with sophisticated gothic overtones. His compelling take on an exotic genre is now accompanied by this slower, more brooding fourth album that achieves a sort-of feedback loop where the slower demeanor inspires more captivating hooks. Its criminally short length just forces one to throw it on infinite playback like a brand new street drug that has a short, sweet, and severely addicting high.

- See more at: http://inyourspeakers.com/content/review/158-ritualz-hypermotion-x-06182012#sthash.fhBRUzDF.dpuf - In Your Speakers

If Ritualz’s Disaro CD-R explored the murky area between light and dark, this blazing 8-song EP toys with the overlap of harmony and dissonance. And genre. And tempo. And hell, light and dark too, because everything on Ghetto Ass Witch exists in a sort of magickal purgatory. Melodies that clatter along, then disappear; a hot buzz of synth flickering into softer, sweeter bells. Beats that reference hip-hop (of course), but only for texture---the weight of this album, its whole druggy thing, lies in the quick-change of things happening, then unhappening. Naked witches dancing round the woods, circle after hypnotic circle, until all the edges blur. But make no mistake: despite the bits of light coming through in pinpricks, Ghetto Ass Witch is beyond dark. Or rather, it’s beyond otherworldly. In this new Ritualz Realm, there’s no distinction between light and dark, fast and slow, pretty and hideous. Tracks like “Baba Vanga” and “Laguna” go almost seasick with the push and pull of it all; narcotic house slamming against pop hooks, a steady beat dragging along the slow lag of ambient noise. Disorienting isn’t the word. It’s a puzzle, some unending maze. And it’s polished, at least more than before, with that new bit of sheen managing to both heighten the disorientation and hold it all together. Even a seemingly basic track like “Big Magick Hustlas” goes complex under the less-raw vibe; vocals pop in fits and starts, leaving room for all that atmospheric hiss to weave, snake-like, through the clacks of snare and cymbal. Ghetto Ass Witch hasn’t totally reinvented Ritualz’s wheel, but it has reframed his points of reference: a new coven of sounds swarming around each other, perpetually caught in a wicked in-between. - Mishka Bloglin