Another interesting release by PAN, whose juicy catalogue fattens up with this split 12" on white vynil by two couples whose moniker is a three-letter one. The first side has been signed by SND aka Blir, a Sheffield-based duo made up of Mat Steel and Mark Fell, who gained a remarkable respect for their sonic artefacts on Mille Plateaux, which managed to influence the so-called "clink'n'cut" scene even if they don't assimilate to it, and a number of smashing live performance, sound installations, events and tours (including the European touring with Autechre as support performers and sound design for The Designers Republic). SND fills it with "15/16", an hypnotic stuttering loop based on nice cuts on claps, gamelan, swooshes, bumps and hats who recalled to my mind "Chinese Flow" by D'Arcangelo Bros'project Monomorph (without those chirping crickets...maybe as a dire consequence of pollution they died...). The second couple of sound-shapers is NHK by Japanese producer Kouhei Matsunaga and Toshio Munehiro, who assembled four jerking engines for the occasion: the deviant ticking of a mechanical clock whose movement appears stopped by means of metal melting acid in "fu2", soaking overcompressed buzz which sounds suffocating a sort of ska-punk rhythm in "111230_2ndhalf", the disturbing drilling of "Hydra_a" (I imagined an attempt of pollination by a confused bee with metal powder or digestive troubles by some bug created by David Thrussel) and the funny electromechanical jumps and hiccups over an assembly line in "stomp1_s".