PitchMod - Arcadia (review)

Raymus Media - Rio Grande Valley alternative music site
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Welcome to Review Redemption Week! We’re posting album reviews from earlier this year that were not uploaded in time. Come back tomorrow for more RGV music.

The aggressive IDM style of PitchMod’s latest EP is an experimental, percussive, and droning episode filled with gripping timbre. (Originally released March 24, 2020)

Score: 6/10

PitchMod is a project by Carlos Martinez that has the harsh industrial noise and techno pulse that’s fit for a rave, and the experimental IDM soundscapes more suited for home listening. As someone who is from the Reynosa-McAllen borderplex and has resided in Austin since, Martinez’s exposure to different music scenes and to decades of electronic music manifests into an EP with some interesting choices of timbre and techniques.

Immediately we hear the EP’s MO in Repetition — bubbling synth notes glitching in and out, screeching and scraping chords, and thumping four-on-the-floor beats. It’s a hypnotic, psychedelic, and nostalgic celebration of 90’s techno in all it’s noisy glory.

There’s more syncopation and sounds used in Dexter. The gargling notes and dynamics are reminiscent of Daphni’s brand of IDM, and the cleaner structure of the song makes this the most engaging on an EP that’s meant to be free-form. Sounds pile up and create more tension, including static, harsh effects, and rubbery drones. At the end, the music dies down and makes way for a buzzing industrial solo that’s as playful as it is dissonant.

Jupiter is heavily percussion-driven with scarce melody. Occasionally a chord zips by, but overall, the atonality and noise make this a long otherworldly expedition.

The lengthy passages come with a lack of development and flow that could cause listener fatigue, and the sounds and techniques are nothing new to anyone with a basic familiarity with EDM of the past. However, the bold resurrection of niche styles and strong fundamentals for dance beats make this a competent album to bring up in discussions of local electronic music.

Score: 6/10

Thanks for reading! Listen to Arcadia below, or click here for Spotify and Apple Music.
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