Credit: Erick Feiling

The sex, drugs and rock & roll mystique has a permanent grip on the imagination for good, well-documented reason. Hell, almost any creative person can attest to the enhancing virtues of chemical vice. But as with all things sensational, reality can get distorted on its way to becoming legend. The truth is often more shaded. Any episode of Behind the Music will tell you that.  

That’s one of the defining threads in the new release by Ocoee electronic artist Rev. Negative. “Space God is my ultimate album,” says Richie Collins, the man behind the name. “My first album produced without alcohol. Like in 20 years.”

“During this stage of my life, I had just got out of the hospital from detoxing from alcohol and possibly needing a liver transplant,” he says. “Not knowing how much time I had left on this earth, I made it my mission to release one final album, my opus magnum so to speak, and I had to do it without alcohol which was very scary and weird because I had gotten used to producing while under the influence.”

Now about the lore of rock & roll excess. It’s seductive. So much so that defying it can feel anticlimactic, like a soft-focus Hallmark ending to a hard-core pulp novel. That’s not how this tale goes. 

As it turns out, sobriety hasn’t blunted Rev. Negative’s edge. True to his longtime ethos, Rev. Negative eschews the slick gloss often endemic to electronic dance music for raw underground grit. This is definitely not some sterile Tiësto bullshit here. On the 14-track Space God, his palette still leans toward variety and intensity, with a spectrum that encompasses acid, hardcore breakbeat (“Kill the Purple Murk”), dubstep (“Negative Bot 3000,”  “A Simple Goodbye Would Suffice”), breaks (“Dracula’s Synthesizer”), EBM (“The 2nd Acid Vat,” “Groove Till You Cutoff,” “Dildo Shantyh”) and dark downtempo (“Bittersweet Negativity”). 

Space God is a work of fresh focus. More than just maintaining bite, the songs cut with new poignancy. With hooks more incisive and beats more penetrating, the sound design here is a new apex of definition and precision for Rev. Negative. It’s his sharpest expedition yet through the fertile electronic tunnels between dance, industrial and experimental.

Space God now streams everywhere and sits atop TLU’s Spotify playlist. It’s also available for download and in very limited cassette release with special bonus track through area label Illuminated Paths.

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This article appears in Dec. 3-9, 2025.

Music columnist.