[reviews] afe035lcd
frog pocket: caric kils

Scotland’s Frog Pocket deliver a tender forty minute selection of soft, meandering electronica, peppered with strange accents and peculiar instrumentation.

Things get underway with "Fir Faas", a track somewhat difficult to categorize. At times, it comes off as a simple, childlike melody played repeatedly (with slight variations) over its short length. Listening again, it evokes a type of Jewish folk song never before recorded.

A strange foot to start off on, but the melody is inviting and sets a distinct tone for the rest of the disc. From there, Frog Pocket take us to a peaceful setting on "Underwood Ladykirk", which pleases with guitar chords that sit atop a restless, stuttering percussion track. The technology threatens to overtake the acoustic elements at some moments, but a fair balance is always kept.

A couple of other tracks follow this course here, the best example probably being "My Little Friend", which teases in an illusory state of simplicity. They even have the courage to bring out the fiddles for the track "Felix Kubin", and the results are positively engaging.

Towards the end of the disc, Frog Pocket lay it on thick in "Come on the Arches!", a track that teeters from tranquil melody to all-out sonic assault. Even though many of the tracks contain blazingly edited sequences, the effects are never jarring.

The whole disc seems to have a type of glaze that has been draped over the sounds, resulting in a cohesive and well-formed collection of music, rather than just another smartly programmed one.

[Vils M. Di Santo]