Andrew Clinco is back, decked out to the scalp as Noel Skum; the fictional frontman of LA doomsday preachers VR SEX. Their latest single ‘Victim or Vixen’ is a warning shot ahead of the sophomore album ‘Rough Dimension’, due March 25th via Dais.
If Harrison Ford had been peer-pressured to do glue and shave his head, Blade Runner could well be the film adaption of VR SEX’s return. It’s futuristic but oh so eighties, with a reluctant protagonist treading the fine line of dystopia and reality with a steel toed boot. The track opens with hold music for a bad trip, but it’s not long before we’re relieved with a nod to Killing Joke and a drum kit which was purchased with literally 50% off. Here, Clinco (or Skum) is flexing his dingy muscles as he broods over a chorus pedal.
‘Victim or Vixen’ would be an ideal late addition to the near-perfect Skate 3 soundtrack; a drug-punk quickie which holds the mirror up to the modern world, patiently waiting for it to realise its own hideousness and bad taste. Instead of being stunned into a doom-scrolling eternity, VR SEX draw attention to our collective despair and entomb it within something the rest of us can bob our heads to.
Photo by Corrine Schiavone
