4 out of 5

Label: Offen Music

Produced by: Jonny Moy

Bouncy, thoroughably enjoyable fare from Jonny Moy. Again conforming to his chosen label, MOY’s The Caustic Wymondham arrives on Offen, an excellent label – to my ears – which leans towards beat heavy, danceable fare, but often with a sense of place; so here we find Jonny, playing up the low-end of his beats, and letting the production be warm and spacious, and naming the EP after a Norfolk town.

Does this represent the Wymondham music scene? Should I try to read into the ‘Caustic’ in the album title, and a track called ‘Strange Geometry?’ I mean, I can’t find much controversy in a casual scrape of the wiki page, and, frankly, the tunes sound dang upbeat to me, so I’m going to take the psyched-out visuals and the synthy tone to be more like a cheeky, classic-era Doctor Who trip through an English town, and then it feels right on point. Even without that “analysis,” though, Wymondham’s four tracks (five on digital, grumble grumble) do paint a picture of bounding across fields and through calming liminal spaces, with the bubbly, squelchy acid of Phaseacid perhaps the entrypoint to a different type of trip, calling to mind Aphex Twin’s On, and thus rainy days and empty – but exciting – buildings to explore. That leads toward some truly jubilant stuff: Outburst brings in the chirpy synths and retro percussion as we get really rolling; and as evening of our journey looms on the B-side, the sounds get slippier, the beats break: Strange Geometry finds us sobering up, appreciating our surroundings as they sharpen; and a closing celebratory, bass-heavy groove with Platonic, which is a thoroughly enjoyable track… but also ultimately a bit repetitive, hitting the longest length at six minutes.

Framing this as a drug trip is too reductive, but it’s a useful one: the entirety of The Caustic Wymondham is a great time, and kind of surface level simple with its accessible beats and general good cheer, though packed within all that is a nice full house of experiences as well.