SXSW 2012

Most commonly known as three-fifths of the influential indie-synth outfit, The Faint, Clark Baechle, Todd Fink, and Jacob Thiele have begun their journey into the future of sound with their new project Depressed Buttons. The men behind the drums, vox, and keyboards of the revered Faint were among the first to give punk kids a taste of keyboard-based dance music in the late 1990s -- when dancing was not cool. Now outfitted as Depressed Buttons, they will take on the electronic/dance world with an entirely new sound. With remixes for Of Montreal and Boys Noize under their belts and remixes for Boy 8-Bit and Shinichi Osawa on the way, Mad Decent signed them to release their first EP, "QWERTY," on December 7th.

The four-track EP does not digress from The Faint’s intentions to make an entire audience fill the dance floor, but Depressed Buttons does lead into a new sound of digital dance dimension. With a filthy lust for synthesizers, the band creates all of their own tracks, leaving listeners entranced and entangled within a web of angular stabs and thick pads. Don’t let the word “depressed” fool you, a button that's depressed isn't sad; it's turned on, which is exactly what "QWERTY" does to listeners.