Frog Pocket has previously featured on the Benbecula compilation “Music Volume One and Two” and the self-entitled Alba Absurdia Recordings compilation, which was reviewed here at Electronic Desert in 2002. “Moon Mountain of the Fords” is a seven-track release on Benbecula featuring Frog Pocket and it’s also his solo debut on the label. Starting off with an excellent minimal intro with amplitude of melancholic melody and a hint of glitch and childlike instrumentation entitled “Jupiter Lady Mountain Village” quite brilliant actually. “Oh, The Place You’ll Go” features a nice bassline, beats treatment and some gently played guitar riffs, flowing out into a river made off the lushest of strings, but the slightly nervous beats give you a hint of what to come. “Always Never (Dumfries and Galloway Mix)” contains an array of on and off beats with a lot of trickery influenced by AFX all fused with a quirky melody. Mid-way into the song it breaks down and the beats are accompanied by a healthy bassline and vocals as heavily transformed as the beats, in short very much in the AFX spirit. “Omulad” has a decisive acoustic feeling to it and it is created by the mixture of minimal almost non-existent beats and the guitar making up the main melody of the song, which layers of guitars then join. All in all making it a different sounding and very beautiful song. “Mountain Lady Jupiter Village” is beatless and has a nursery rhyme like melody played on yet another childlike instrument and it’s quite delightful. “My Mental Ass” is reminiscent of “Always Never (Dumfries and Galloway Mix)” in the sense that it contains beats that have gone astray, starting off with a kind of tongue-in-cheek treatment of other musical genres that doesn’t go down to well with me, but hey, I guess it is question of preferences. Actually Frog Pocket succeeds in ripping trough at least three styles or so in this song and yes, the obligatory mashed-up vocals are included. “Hey Hope” is another thing altogether with some solid programmed beats, subtly shifting pace and structure as they move alongside a warm lush bassline, a lonely gentle guitar and a sea of strings. A hint of a sampled vocal can also be detected in this finishing and lovely track. The Frog Pocket EP spans over quite a wide area of electronic music and at times the influences are a bit too visible, on the other hand when they’re not, Frog Pocket makes distinct and fragile music, acoustically influenced electronic music that is both unique and beautiful.
electronic desert ≡ revisited + extended