Rust Index by Latebook

When we started on *Rust Index*, we weren't just thinking about sounds. We were thinking about where those sounds come from, the places forgotten, the guts of old machinery still hummin' after midnight, drip-drip-dripping in the dark. We lugged our gear into those abandoned freight lines, contact mics searching out every groan, every echo. We weren't just recording; we were listening for something trying to tell a story. This whole thing, it’s a nocturnal trek, a path cut through a labyrinth of rust and steel. You start with that quiet stutter, a shaky rhythm like doubt settling in, those first steps into the dark. You feel the tension build, the flickers of light trying to make sense of the signals. Are those machines talking back? Or is it just us, finding patterns in the decay? We tried to let the water drop, the metal scrapes, become their own kind of percussion, marking time in a slow, almost intimate way. There’s a moment in there, a quiet surrender inside a gutted engine, where you realize this isn't just about exploring outward. It's about what opens up inside you. Then, the junction, where that whisper, "keep the engine breathing," starts to really take hold. It becomes a rally cry, a kind of shared breath between us and the rumbling steel. That's where things really shift. You hear the phantom broadcasts, the machine chorus, blurring the lines between what’s real and what’s just echoing in your head. And then... the surge. All those boiler rooms unlocking at once, a roar that just pulls you under, turning into something like molten faith. It’s a cathartic rush, a release where everything comes together, machine and human, singing as one. After that, the quiet, the vapor trails, a chance to breathe and just let the aftertrace settle. And finally, bolting that last hatch shut, hearing those faint clicks of the machinery almost rephrasing that engine breath mantra, like a quiet blessing. We wanted this journey, from that first stutter of uncertainty to that final, steel-bolted conviction, to feel lived. Not just heard. To take these industrial ghosts and give them a voice, a new purpose. It’s about reclaiming what’s left behind, finding the future in the rust. We think there’s something vital in that, something that resonates far beyond just sound, a narrative woven into the very fabric of decay.

We craft our tracks in forgotten places where machines still hum after midnight. Contact mics catch dripping pipes and settling metal, turning industrial ghosts into hypnotic loops that pull you under.