Mouse On Mars - Varcharz [Ipecac - 2006] Varcharz is Mouse on Mars' first release for Mike Patton's Ipecac label. Following their most pop oriented effort, Radical Connector, this album is more jagged and hard edged than anything they've ever done. Varcharz runs the gamut stylistically, which is no surprise really, considering that Mouse On Mars have tackled just about every sub-genre within electronica over the years. The difference here is that, while MoM are usually pleasant, upbeat, and relatively easy to swallow, a few of these tracks are more challenging and experimental. There are no vocals on the album, lots of distortion and plenty of rough edges. The first couple of tracks (Chartnok and Fishbord, AKA I Go Ego Why Go We Go) are variations on break-beat and funk music. Each track starts off with a simple beat and melody, and then is manipulated, pulled apart, and riffed over with noisy synths and crunchy digital bits. The Next track Düül sounds like an instrumental death metal track put through a blender. The track gets seriously disfigured over its running time, with shards of sound flying in every direction. A nice detour. Hi Feinlin is an interesting tune with a fairly complex melody, played in the background from the outset, overlaid with foreground noises and distortion. The juxtaposition of elements makes this track one of the album's most successful. Bertney is a house influenced track with a kind of a warped, wavy feel, which provides enough subversion to make it unique. Unfortunately, not all of the tracks succeed. Inocular, though only two minutes long, is a repetitive little jungle track with little point. Retphase is a simple track with a standard house influenced keyboard riff, which over time has been repeated on countless house music discs. Though it is manipulated a bit in an attempt to make it different, the riffing is too familiar to escape from. One Day, Not Today, the last song, is actually broken up on the CD indexing into 13 tracks. It starts off with short, violent sprays of noise and malfunctioning beats, which, depending on the day, will either energize you or drive you insane. There is virtually no rhyme or reason to the first 12 tracks, which range from 5 seconds to over two minutes each. While this makes for an intriguing first listen, it's not an experience that lends itself to repeated listens. The 13th track of One Day, Not Today is a cloudy, distorted coda of sorts, which lasts for over five minutes. So Varcharz is a partly successful Mouse on Mars album when taken as a whole. There is certainly enough here to please hardcore fans, and the duo should be commended for their experimentation. Perhaps this restlessness will lead to something great in the future.    Erwin Michelfelder
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