Symeta

When avant garde and abstract German electronic musician Olaf Bender (44), better known as Byetone, was unleashed on us in chest thumping glory at the recent Taste of Sonar, a friend roared into my ear: “This is punk!” He was so damn right. Techno is often associated with ice-cold intellectualism and with very little that is visceral, but not Byetone. One of his influences, he told me in an interview, was post-punk band Joy Division and you can hear it not only live but on this album too. This is his second album; it is futuristic robot music, but it also has the groove and the funk. What I really love about it is that it speaks to your feet, your heart and your head. You can’t ask for more than that.