“This dance is ancient”…bad thoughts, good thoughts…no thoughts. “Pattern of Thoughts” kicks off The Skull Defekts excellent 2014 LP Dances In Dreams Of The Known Unknown, out now on Thrill Jockey. Bristling with an urgency that borders on violent, but tempered with powerful restraint, on this track Joachim Nordwall and Daniel Fagerstroem attack their guitars with the kind of honed precision a skilled black belt might use to brake bricks with a single karate chop, while drummer Jean-Louis Huhta‘s repetitive, tribal rhythm adds a ritualized air to the proceedings. When Nordwall’s almost slurred vocals bubble to the surface, they sound like those of a man channeling a mytho-poetic force from the depths. “This dance is ancient”, he repeats, before wondering about it’s source, and conjecturing that it might have been used for: “sex magick ritual”, “or maybe controlling animals”, “or just having a good time”. The video for “Pattern of Thoughts” concentrates on the musicians, using looped, repeating snippets of their movements to create a hypnotic visual experience that actually seems to enact this track’s central sonic principle!
