Artisans don’t just play music - they dismantle it, rewire it with crude soldering, drench it in fluorescent irony, and then roll it in digital trash until it’s both unrecognizable and somehow more honest than before. "synthetic piss", their second album, is an irreverent, patchwork manifesto, stitched together from MIDI relics, PowerPoint aesthetics, Windows XP-era nostalgia, and the ghosts of obsolete sound libraries. If this is an ensemble, it’s one held together by self-deprecation, provocation, and a deep, almost suspicious commitment to sincerity.

The album is a mixtape of postmodern absurdity. It opens with "Concerto for Timpani & Chorus – V", a supposed composition by the shadowy, never-performed Thomas Farmer. Whether he ever existed doesn’t matter - Artisans resurrect his ghost in a tumble of theatrical percussion and self-imposed anachronisms. "cOuNtDoWns" by Liepa Vozgirdait feels like a frantic attempt to predict the future while using broken technology. "Iš lp lpas" sways with a sense of melancholic playfulness, and the title track, "Synthetic Piss", is both a literal and figurative act of defiance - a chaotic, seven-minute outburst that sounds like a MIDI orchestra trapped in a burning hard drive.

Then there’s "diagnostikos centre", a reimagining of Gediminas K.’s cult song, now bent through the prism of Artisans’ irreverence. It’s part homage, part mutation. "Rumšos polka" waltzes into folk territory but refuses to do so politely. "cunty" (yes, that’s the title) is as cheeky as its name suggests - snarky, textural, and unapologetically glitch-ridden. The inclusion of "22-M (Opus 58)" by Anthony Braxton is a sly nod to Artisans’ ability to keep one foot in academia while kicking down its doors with the other. The closing track, "su gimtadieniu", feels like a distorted, last-minute birthday greeting - clumsy, sarcastic, but endearing in its messy sincerity.

This album is many things: a love letter to failure, an inside joke taken too far, a refusal to conform, a study in sonic collage. But most of all, "synthetic piss" is a deliberate, joyful act of sabotage against the pretensions of contemporary music. Artisans stare academic snobbery dead in the eye - and then stick a MIDI trombone in its face.