Romvelope provide an intensely satisfying conglomeration of chopped bits and diced pieces via “Catomountain”/”Hodmandod,” their compositions ticking like a clock and squealing like digital pigs. Dissemble a few of those nice Minority Records artists (DVA, Floex, Dikolson), dissolve any notion of random button-pushing, and dissuade yourself from assuming you’ve pinned this one down until the final non-notes pass by. “Hodmandod” spellbinds from the start through little more than a murky drone cloud that pours audio endorphins effortlessly into your brainpiece. Why is this so much more enlightening than the average desert drift? The melodica (apparently that’s actually a reed organ)? The tangled mix? The wistful search for new stars? We may never know. “Catomountain” is more, ahem, classical experimental simply because it provides crags for the cliff-jumping listener to hang onto, in the form of jumpy rhythms and all manner of pitch-bent manipulation. A quality effort all around that could blast off with more room to stretch out.
More about: Romvelope
