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Manslaughter 777

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Manslaughter 777, “God’s World” (Thrill Jockey, 2025)

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I was a big fan of the 2021 debut from this duo of drummers Lee Buford (The Body) and Zac Jones (Braveyoung/MSC), but that definitely did not stop me from being somewhat blindsided by this wilder and more eclectic follow up. In fact, Jones himself aptly describes God’s World as ”maybe the craziest record I’ve ever worked on” and further notes that the duo set out to record music that “people could play at parties.” Notably, that party rockin’ mindset did not steer the duo away from their earlier Godflesh-adjacent post-industrial heaviness all that much, but those sludgier, more industrial sounds now coexist with a more playful and vivid array of other influences ranging from jungle to gamelan to hip-hop to rocksteady. While I have historically been frequently annoyed by artists who make aggressive genre-slicing a central feature of their art, Manslaughter 777 masterfully make that approach feel like a refreshing delight, as this album feels like a dangerously out-of-control party train from start to finish.

The album opens in appropriately killer fashion with “I Do Not Believe in Art,” which quickly locks into an insistent kick drum throb with a cool acid bass line and a ghostly vocal hook. It is great while it lasts, but it soon transforms into an equally cool breakbeat surprise with a chopped soul diva hook and stuttering rap fragments. Things only get more wild and festive from there, as the following “Power In the Blood” sounds like it could be an unhinged Meat Beat Manifesto remix of a Snap! or C&C Music Factory hit (aside from the blown-out sludgy outro featuring an amusing Xanadu-style double clap). Next, “Child Of” evokes straight-up ‘90s R&B aside from a digitally mangled melodic hook that sounds like it could have been plucked from an early Severed Heads album, while “Luv” is a left-field reimagining of Dennis Brown’s “Money In My Pocket” that unexpectedly blossoms into a noisy crescendo of smoldering noise wreckage, deep bass, and skittering drums. The first side of the album then concludes with a piece that sounds like a roiling industrial deconstruction of an angelic New Age vocal album.

Despite that improbable array of delights and surprises, most of my favorite pieces fall on the album’s more uneven second half. I cannot say I love the dancehall-rooted “Silk Barricade” all that much, but the “every night is a soundclash” refrain summarizes the album’s vision nicely and the final minutes evoke a solid dubbed-out Godflesh dirge. The following “Pulling A Truck Up a Hill,” however, unleashes an absolutely mesmerizing Afro-Latin groove that sounds like a deep psych-minded gamelan ensemble. Sadly, it only lasts for two minutes, as it could have easily been a mindblowing 20-minute juggernaut. The same is true of “Clipped and 15 (Extended),” as a muscular breakbeat is gradually enhanced with layers of chopped up and trippy sounds before unexpectedly resolving into a heavy ritualistic drone outro. Again, I would love to hear an even more extended version someday, but at least this one clocked in at a relatively substantial five minutes. Between those two bangers lies yet another killer piece, as “Die In The Night” sounds like it could be a great contemporary Muslimgauze remix. The album then closes with a brief but banging hip-hop groove/victory lap (the “can I breathe now?” sample being an especially inspired choice). 

Notably, the entire wild ride only lasts about thirty minutes, but that brevity is 100% justified by the album’s “all killer, no filler” lineup of instantly gratifying delights, as I imagine a longer album would probably get a bit numbing. That said, I would love to hear Buford and Jones (and producer Seth Manchester) try their hand at some more longform psych excursions some day, as they definitely know how to keep a killer groove rolling and have wonderful taste in samples and dubby studio flourishes, but this raucous party is definitely not the place for something like that (and no one wants to ruin a party). At its best (which is most of the time), God’s World feels like an impossibly cool and freewheeling soundclash or pirate radio transmission (an impression that is nicely enhanced by the album’s bootleg-style artwork).  

Listen here.  

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Manslaughter 777, “World Vision Perfect Harmony” (Thrill Jockey, 2021)

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This auspicious debut brings together The Body’s drummer (Lee Buford) with his counterpart from Braveyoung (Zac Jones). Apparently, the pair have been fitfully collaborating since the two bands joined forces for 2011’s Nothing Passes, but they have not released anything until now. Unsurprisingly, World Vision Perfect Harmony is an impressively heavy and beat-driven affair, stylistically landing in a place that calls to mind a collision of some cool late ’90s Justin Broadrick side project, the industrial-strength hip-hop of early Kareem, and the noise-ravaged techno of Container. 

Somehow the album is even better than that sounds, however, as Buford and Jones often display an impressively intuition for perfectly balancing bludgeoning force, eerily hallucinatory samples, a head-bobbing BPM, and an occasional well-paced hook or flurry of hyperkinetic percussion. In a few cases, Manslaughter 777’s relentless rhythmic assault and constrained palette start to yield diminishing returns, but at least half the album is legitimately excellent and there are a few killer “singles” that will be finding their way into my playlists for years.

The opening “No Man Curse” provides quite a stellar introduction to the Manslaughter 777 vision, as a gibbering and clattering cacophony of samples gives way to a slow, heavy, and unexpectedly sensuous groove with the ghost of a pop hook hazily floating above the bass-heavy throb. Then, in the final minute, it explodes into a punishing and densely layered finale of electronic noise, ribcage rattling bass, and skittering fills. That visceral catharsis segues into the relentlessly propulsive “Jump and Spread,” which simultaneously heightens and derails the more “pop” sensibilities of its predecessor. It kind of sounds like someone laid down a soulful vocal track for a rocksteady album, but the usual Kingston session musicians were busy and Revolting Cocks had to be frantically rushed in as a last-minute replacement. 

After a solid jungle-inspired detour (“ARC”), the album reaches its zenith with “I Can Not Tell You How I Feel,” which sounds like a chopped, screwed, and autotuned R&B jam remixed for an industrial-themed strip club. The duo’s love of melodic hooks goes into remission a bit for the album’s more abstract and hallucinatory second half, but their weirder side offers some highlights too. I especially like the stammering, spectral, and deconstructed groove of “What Is Joke To You Is Dead To Me” and the thumping, burrowing psychedelia of “Mag Tech.” 

The closer (“Do You Know Who Loves You”) is a stunner as well, as a slow, hypnotic throb provides the foundation for a chopped, skittering, and dub-wise percussion onslaught that ultimately gives way to a slamming hip-hop beat enveloped in warm, choral haze. I did not expect such a melodic and perversely angelic ending, but I probably should have, as inventive juxtapositions abound here. Manslaughter 777 are definitely onto something good, often resembling some classic WaxTrax! project blessed with strikingly varied, forward-thinking influences and access to modern recording software.

Samples can be found here.