Kush Arora aka Only Now Mixes Industrial Techno & More With Hindustani Drumwork On 'Timeslave III'

San Francisco-based Indian diaspora artist Kush Arora has just released his new album 'Timeslave III' as 'Only Now', marking 10 years of the moniker.

The 11-track release dials the grit of Arora's self-titled style of 'dread bass' and makes its beats more rigid to enter industrial techno's domain for the album's first half. More notably, Arora discovers and highlights seemingly natural similarities between hard techno and India's street culture of soundsystem battles and dhol-tasha performances as passages stop to present bars of only guttural kicks designed to physically shake a person when played over powerful enough sound systems.

Equally visceral bass drones ring out as the exchange of rhythms between dhol tasha ring out within techno's structures, and the lo-fi quality of the soundsystems is reflected in the crushed and overdriven textures. This synergy is most equitably represented on 'Merciless III', a track in collaboration with percussionist Dave Sharma, which follows the album's first excursion into the ambient and noise with 'Rivers Of Despair'.

After that, the album pivots towards more of those beat-less excursions as characteristically Indian melodies (likely field recordings) get a haunting treatment and equally haunting company of deep synth notes. To add a political context to this transformation of techno under influences from Arora's homeland, 'Timeslave III' reminds us of the West's ill-treatment of India with the album cover utilising a photo of a corpses-strewn battleground in Lucknow in the aftermath of the country's 1857 military uprising.

Listen to 'Timeslave III' below and follow Only Now for more.