Venetian Snares is the moniker of Canadian electronic musician Aaron Funk, aka Jason Kohnen, one of the auteurs of drum'n'bass, who debuted with a series of limited-edition cassettes, singles and the CD-Rom Greg Hates Car Culture (1999). Venetian Snares pioneered the genre drill & bass, although it’s now more widely known as breakcore. Venetian Snares wont be to everybodies taste, but electronica and dnb fans will no doubt appreciate at least aspects to this experimental sound. Szamár Madár is from the 2005 album Rossz Csillag Allat Született, a pretty damn good album, although too much in one sitting can leave me feeling nauseous.

He established his trademark "breakcore" style of complex, brutal, distorted, skittering, whirling drum programming (with a manic passion for the 7/4 time signature and often only consisting of "clicks and cuts") on Printf("shiver in eternal darkness/n") (2000), containing the lengthy Stuck and Mouth, and especially Doll Doll Doll (Hymen, 2001), an intimidating sequence of longer visceral pieces (Befriend A Childkiller, Pressure Torture, All The Children Are Dead).

Huge Chrome Cylinder Box Unfolding (Planet Mu, 2004) and the "Hungarian" album Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett (Planet Mu, 2005) introduced strings, horns and piano (sometimes omitting the rhythm altogether) in order to structure the chaos into emotional and melodic "songs". The discovery of melodrama signaled a complete change in psychology, from punk terrorist to nostalgic dreamer and existential philosopher. The ebullient atmosphere of Szerencsetlen is a misleading manifesto, blending drum'n'bass and classical music in the form of frantic breakbeats coupled with snippets of orchestra. The decadent atmosphere of ngyilkos Vasarnap, created by slower beats and a female lounge singer, is a better introduction to the mood of the album. A sense of angst and tension exudes from the rhythm-less electro-acoustic intermezzo Felbomlasztott Ment”kocsi. A haunting string melody traverses the turbulent rhythmic carpet of Szamar Madar. The symphonic Hajnal picks up speed, fueled by beats and gypsy violin, but projects a gloomy outlook that is fulfilled by M sodik Galamb, a sophisticated interplay of cacophonous and pompous elements, approaching the sonic chaos of a videogame. Both the intricacy of the beats and the emotion of the orchestra culminate with the nine-minute Ketsarku Mozgalom, that includes an intermezzo with samples of natural sounds and of human voices.