There’s always storytelling and throughline in Liliane Chlela’s work, even in the most brutal driving grooves. Anatomy of a Jerk delivers that same narrative clarity and floor-rumbling authority, out on Mexico City’s Infinite Machine imprint.
Born in Beirut and based in Montreal, connecting to both the North American and Lebanese scenes, Liliane Chlela remains someone whose work deserves close listening. There’s really more than enough music to test your subwoofer or show off some beat programming; Liliane’s music, by contrast, always has something to say. And while the sounds are hard-boiled, they flow easily, without ever losing momentum or second-guessing a phrase. Even in sparse, broken breakdowns, you’re still gently pulled along. The Mexico City label here seems the perfect pairing; it’s also been home to favorites like Tijuana native Microhm (Leslie García). Tracks can simultaneously sound violent and serene, dense without feeling crowded, powerful without feeling forced.
“Bison,” the opener, is already a tour-de-force, sophisticated harmonic figuration against industrial rhythmic motives; you know you’re in for a ride on this one. “bza2” puts delicate, melancholy melodies against rapid-fire broken beats. “Friendly Fire” gets playful, even, letting loose with the grooves at the end – almost like a prompt for another track in this direction. There’s the gorgeously warped, cinematic “Ouverture,” the juicy pitch envelopes on “Third Fraud.” I was already fortunate to get to play out “Rave Melancho” out and on the radio; it’s devastating and is the easy “single” to pick out of this one.
“Did I Stutter” isn’t conventional club music in its structure, but it is the kind of adventurous track a great DJ would drop and tear apart a floor … and do it multiple times over. So much of Liliane’s music cleverly draws from the stew of breakcore and IDM without ever referencing anything specifically; it’s always original.
You could be let off easy for the end of this one, but instead, you get the jaw-dropping horror of “The Right to Offend Itself,” which sounds personal and soul-crushing. We need music with impact like this right now.
A reminder of the previous project, too:
Oh yeah, and there was this great music video, too [warning – blinking lights / repeating patterns]
And uh, we should all get together and shoot some new live videos, myself included – Boiler Room or no – but it’s still fun to go back to this one anyway:
Of course where we all really went wrong is that too many of us missed out on Rewire Festival, so we didn’t see the live premiere of this new project, which looks … insane.
And it looks like you had to be there. So, uh, next time (Montreal, obviously, head to MUTEK!):
https://www.lilianechlela.media/bio