EP2 / Single Blip – from Vince Clarke and Martin L. Gore’s highly anticipated collaboration, VCMG – rears its head on 27 February 2012, with remixes from Byetone and Mathew Jonson.

A pounding motorik beat heralds the start of this minimal electronic tour de force. With primal drums and puckering bleeps, it’s an industrial battle cry of the darkest proportions, setting teeth on edge with nails-across-blackboard screeching, ominous synths and spiraling rhythms.

EP2 / Single Blip remixes come courtesy of sparce electronic artist Byetone, aka Berliner Olaf Bender, co-founder and the man responsible for the iconic design output at Raster-Noton. His 2011 album Symeta featured in Fact and The Quietus’ end of year polls, and previous remix credits inc Modeselektor and eLan.

Alongside is a remix from Mathew Jonson, co-founder of Wagon Repair label and key member of electronic improvisers Cobblestone Jazz. Canadian born Jonson has previously remixed the likes of Plastikman, Tiga and Chemical Brothers to great acclaim.

‘SSSS’ – the debut album by VCMG – is out on 12 March 2012 and boasts ten tracks of the same Teutonic turn-ons. Written and produced by Clarke and Gore, the album was mixed by Timothy “Q” Wiles and recorded and engineered by Sie Medway Smith and Clarke.

Mastered by Stefan Betke (aka Pole), the album demonstrates Clarke and Gore’s shared love of electronic music and marks the arrival proper of this enigmatic duo who have teamed up again after thirty years.

Speaking to MOJO this month, Clarke says the collaborative process was “really about exchanging colours… like two people doing a painting in a different room,” and Gore confessed his preference for “anything that’s a bit darker…with a driving rhythm.”