Do It For The Money by Brutus VIII is an intense listen. It certainly isn’t a record made for fun, or even for an audience, necessarily. Just kind of something he had to get out of his system before it ate him alive. In a compelling way, the EP is hard to sit with and a little emotionally messing. My Eating Disorder is already a fucking heavy name that mirrors the cacaphony that of the EP. Distorted synths crash over blown-out drum machines. His voice slips between monotone and manic, whispering the line “I just wanna be someone else.” Someone who has lived in his own head for too long, he’s expressing the longing and loneliness, mirroring the internal chaos through his music.

“Do It for the Money” keeps the same pressure. Bass-heavy and disoriented, it rides a dark techno groove while he confesses, “I did it for the money, I did it for the friendships I thought I’d get.” An honest mix of bitter cynicism and a clear connection between performance, commodification. By the time he reaches “The Chant” and murmurs, “I got a discotech, but I want to disconnect,” the message is clear.

Then comes “Eichmann on Trial Again,” the EP’s strangest and most fascinating moment. It slows everything down. The spoken word delivery is more pointed, more deliberate. Underneath, electronic organs swell while bursts of saxophone bleed through the cracks. The title references Adolf Eichmann, tried for his role in the Holocaust, and the line “He knows all the words to our favorite hip-hop songs” is bitter irony at the uncomfortable situation he resides in. The whole track feels like a collapse: historical trauma, personal disillusionment, cultural critique, all crumbling together in a wash of jazz and electro.

Brutus VIII builds a world out of broken machines. Blown-out drum loops and twisted synths, bass lines and intense percussion all swirl around vocals that drift from deadpan to desperate. The songwriting balances irony with despair, humor with horror, like someone trying to stay composed while everything is collapsing inside. It’s honestly a little ugly. But it’s also honest, and occasionally beautiful in an authentic way.

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