Viceversa

Album Review

Mauxuam is the nom de glitch of Maurizio Liguori, a longtime veteran of the international underground electro scene. His mixes have been featured on previous Interchill compilations, but this is his first full-length release under his own (assumed) name. Viceversa is billed as a "nomadic diary," put together over the course of Liguori's globetrotting activities during the previous few years. One doesn't hear much that can be easily connected with any specific ethnic or regional traditions, but there is certainly a broad and interesting array of musical elements at play here: "B4 After" hops along slowly amid a welter of weird, Adrian Sherwood-esque sound effects, all boings and squelches and bloops; then "Extended Body" bops and jitters in an unsettled, slightly brooding manner, no less funky but somehow less fun. Then "Jahnesh [Divine Cluster Version]" brings in a slightly glitchy, slightly dubwise feel, and "Stones of Gaza" combines a sort of African Head Charge backbeat with a stop-and-start rhythmic progression and a collage of synthesizer chord clouds and buzzing electronic insect noises. The whole album moves along in that vein, taking familiar elements and twisting them around in unique and really very exciting ways to create something that doesn't sound foreign or innovative as much as it sounds just a bit twisted off center — and that is meant in the best possible way. Excellent.