Longtime Warp Records devotees will be familiar with Sheffield's The Black Dog, whose seminal *Bytes* LP turns 25 years old this year. Hailing from the steel city of the UK North, their name became synonymous with brooding soundscapes and haunting drums that seemed to evoke their post-industrial surroundings (abandoned factories, grey skies) and the city's history of experimental industrial art-punk bands like Cabaret Voltaire and Clock DVA. In 1995, the group split (with Ed Handley and Andy Turner going on to form Plaid); in 2001, remaining member Ken Downie teamed up with the Dust Science brothers – Martin and Richard Dust – to make a string of dark Orwellian albums steeped in interests such as conspiracy theory, avant-electronics and radio waves and surveillance. Their new double disc set – *Post-Truth* and *Black Daisy Wheel* – explores the sordid cycle of disinformation, cognitive dissonance and dread that is our current political climate.
