A more obvious title for this compilation might have been Fragments.

Countless disjointed sounds and ideas collide in carefully-orchestrated disharmony over the course of the EP, and it’s a beautiful mess.

Eight producers each contributed one track to Pelican Fly’s most recent compilation, so variety was expected. The results, however, are completely out of control. Sinjin Hawke toys with choirs, twisted melodies, and scattered percussion for the entire front third of ‘Prom Nite’, before eventually venturing into semi-danceable territory. This groove arises only briefly, but a brow-furrowing combination of grunting brass and spiralling arpeggios treats your ears while it lasts.

Cashmere Cat – Aurora

Cashmere Cat has been brewing up stuttering beats for a while now, and he’s in fine form on this EP. On a side note, it’s always creeped me out that his social media profile pictures are of a pretty girl with her cat, while the producer is actually a thin, pasty dude… All is forgiven when he releases a track such as ‘Aurora’ though. The mish mash of sounds is almost dissonant at times, but as is the case with the whole EP, that only adds to the mood.

It’s more ear-prickling than cacophonic.

Sure, there are hundreds of unusual sounds being thrown around over the course of the EP, but they’ve been pieced together in such a way that makes the listener lean in rather than reject the strangeness of it all. The pure obscurity of the sound combinations found in every track will keep you locked. Another part of that attraction stems from the way that the music makes you want to move, despite how broken many of the beats seem. Samename’s ‘Mishima Curse’ is a great example of that in two senses. As well as sporadically jumping around between ideas and grooves, some of the percussive sounds employed literally sound like shattered pieces of glass and metal banging against each other.

There’s also a difficult-to-explain ‘feel’ common to each track that helps the record find an identity as a whole.  Throughout the whole EP, I can envision an eighty year old Kanye West staggering along a footpath, walking stick in hand. He jerks his weary body forward with a restrained but undeniable confidence and swagger; a hip hop groove resides within him, but his body can’t control its precision.

Whether you’re gyrating and nodding along to the scattered beats, or observing the ever-rotating cast of strange sounds that place themselves before your ears, it’s very difficult to get bored with this release.

Feathers EP is our Sunset Album of the Week (22.2.13 – 28.2.13)

Stream the sampler here and get your mitts on it for real right here