Encountering Torranto's AUS!Funkt is like finding that a species of prehistoric, previously thought to be extinct, shark thriving in the bed of a deep-sea trench. You didn't think something like it could still exist until it takes a bite out of one of your radar apparatus. They're like a glimpse back in time, through a portal lined by rows of teeth, filtering a ravenous hunger through its gills along with a bitter taste of salt and iron. It's incredibly rare now for a post-punk band to have the sense of groove and consent motion that AUS!Funkt possesses, and even rarer for a group to manifest this defining and irregular pulse in a manner that makes their music seem crucial- like the fire alarm rousing you from slumber and into the conscious agony of a smoke-filled room. Their latest LP Turn to Rust feels like is the Cramps attempted to do a version of Au Pair-style new wave after returning from a pan-European tour with Can. Their dialed-up Americana compressed and contorted by exposure to brutalist structures in contrast with old-world elegance inspiring a wayward motorik compulsion, their sense of paranoia heightened by proximity to the frontline of the Cold War, and the smell of clove cigarettes hot on their breath as they plunge into a foundry of jungle heat and disco mayhem. AUS!Funkt's rhythmic inclinations are an abstraction beyond the alienation of art made for and in the mechanical age, a sweaty dribbling form of alienation that cries out wry inquisition, demanding answers that the world cannot possibly provide. Even while gurgling in a backwash of knowledge and progress, they convey the pain of parchedness and the feeling of dying of thirst. Voices ripple and decay as they shoot between the gaps of warping tides of rhythm like radioactive dust particles blown through a window carelessly left ajar two border crossings over from a reactor meltdown and burning cooling tower. AUS!Funkt is throwing a block party of inverted history at the end of time. Shake off the rust from your joints and join in this deadman's dance while flesh still clings to the lattice of your bones.
