(Make Me A) TRISTE© Mixtape Episode 159: Dermabrasion

For just over a year, Dermabrasion have peddled their fleshy post-punk in and around their home town of Toronto, with a deceptively ferocious live show that has landed them supporting slots for the likes of Lydia Lunch Retrovirus, Special Interest, Pixel Grip, Nox Novacula and Front 242’s Patrick Codenys. The duo 2021 demo EP Lunate marked a return to form for members Adam Bernhardt and Kat McGouran, who started writing and performing together in 2015 with defunct Toronto punk band WLMRT. The five tracks on Lunate with a low-fi production that smacks of early Sisters of Mercy recordings offered only a haunting, shadowy outline of what the pair now bring forward with their full-length debut, Pain Behaviour. Released on Toronto-based Hand Drawn Dracula, Pain Behaviour pieces together a collection of influences reflecting the years both musicians have spent skulking around their city’s nightlife. Produced by Josh Korody (Fucked Up, Nailbiter, Breeze, Beliefs, Vallens) and mastered by Noah Mintz, Pain Behaviour completes the baleful statement Dermabrasion first uttered with Lunate. Korody’s experience with electronic music helped hone the band’s sound to a menacing edge they call “death rock and roll,” swinging equally in the directions of first wave and contemporary post-punk, industrial, NWOBHM and meathead rock.

What They Say: “I hope people who listen to this track feel the drums in their chest. We actually rerecorded all five tracks from Lunate with Josh Korody for the new record because we didn’t have a great understanding of how to do what we wanted to do. We wanted to work with him in particular for that reason–he knows guitar music inside out and the textures and qualities he brings to that are amazing. But he’s also a techno DJ and has the kind of industrial sensibility we needed but were too ignorant to understand how to achieve. It was so, so, so awesome working with him” .