DEATH IN VEGAS Vinyl & CDs

Review: Long awed electronic rock moniker Death In Vegas, formerly a duo but now largely masterminded by one Richard Maguire, brings its latest set of cutting room floorers to a very different kind of (dark dance-) floor. The new 'Acid Rejects' series hears DIV cycle through offcut avant-gardisms and industrial churns, veering heavily on sides of unpolished and intense. The daymare 'While My Machines Gently Weep' mourns in dialogue with the synths used to make the track, with its gurgling sawbasses, while the lighter lilt that takes the EP's title manifests as a recompensing sonic dream, with sonar tweeter synths fading in and out over a painterly soundscape.

Review: It could have all been so different when Death In Vegas first formed. Richard Fearless and Steve Hellier spawned the project in 1994 and got signed under the name Dead Elvis, but legal wrangling got in the way and they used the name for their debut album instead. Now Music On Vinyl have repressed the 1997 classic so we can revel in the grizzled take on big beat and trip hop the pair cooked up. It's very much of its time, but there's a snarl to the production which sets Death In Vegas apart from their peers at the time, opting for the dive bar ambience over the festival main stage you'd hear when playing The Chemical Brothers or Leftfield. For that reason Dead Elvis has aged very well indeed.

Review: It's not without good reason four tracks from this unforgettable third album made it onto TV ads and movie soundtracks. Everything about the record is huge and absolutely impossible to ignore. There's the drawled Mancuian indie Britishness of its title track, with Oasis man Liam Gallagher giving it his typical all on lyrical duties. The lo-fi, almost nursery rhyme psychedelics of '23 Lies'. And the strange, alien-like bleeps and warbles of 'Natja'.

This is before we mention the parts with Dot Allison, Hope Sandoval, Nicola Kuperus and Paul Weller. As per usual, Richard Fearless' electronica project - which claims at least another 11 names in its part time members list - is as fearless as it is majestic. Taking us to the soaring heights of string-filled 'Help Youself', before hitting us with the wall of sound alternative rock and rave synths of 'Leather'.