Hand Helds – Hello, Mr. Operator / Transatlantic Death Machine

I was intrigued when the Brisbane-based label Grog Records (re-)issued the Hello, Mr. Operator EP by New York electro punks Hand Helds on cassette, originally released late last year. A closer look at their bandcamp profile reveals not only that they’ve had a new EP out in January already but also that quite obviously they’ve been at it for a while already, churning out a ton of EPs in a varying spectrum of dark and noisy garage punk, minimalist and often quite harsh synth- and electro punk. I’m pretty sure i already came across them in the past but i’m also reminded why i passed over that stuff back then, as much of their earlier cataloque sounds like the equivalent of throwing lots of shit at the wall to see what’s gonna stick. Anyway, a couple of things have stuck apparetly and on their latest two EPs, things click into place way more tightly thanks to a more minimalist and deliberate less-is-more approach. Hello Mr. Operator is certainly the cruder of the two EPs with a heavily…