This release dates back several months at this point, but hey it’s winter and time slows waaaaay down when you’re living in an arctic bubble.  Rambutan is, of course, the solo project of upstate New York’s Eric Hardiman (Tape Drift honch, Century Plants, Burnt Hills), a gentleman that likely needs no introduction within these pages.  Hell, I’m not even going to try to cop some sort of objective stance here, I plain-and-simple love the music that this guy creates.
From what I can gather, Hardiman seems to have ditched his guitar on “Silver Pharmacy” and is working entirely with synths and electronics.  This is perhaps most noticeable on the title track, where lively runaway technoid pulsations dance beneath a blanket of soft white noise.  Things build to a more agitated state, though, towards the end of the track and spill into the all-out menacing howl of “Blindsided,” which reveals that Hardiman may have been infected by the blackened, soul-crushing power of his peers in Locrain.  It’s anybody’s guess as to how far this will spread, but given the more dream-like drift of the flip side’s “Disappearance,” I don’t anticipate that he’ll don facepaint and move to Norway any time soon.  “Silver Pharmacy” is another worthwhile entry in Mr. Hardiman’s ever-expanding, yet always fascinating, discography.
8/10
