3 out of 5

Label: Computer Club

Produced by: NHK yx

The 7″, 2-song version of this release would maybe fare better than the 4-song version, as it pits one amazing glitch track – the A-side title song – against a less impressive but interesting minimalist club jam, 1057_s. It’s a less-is-more equation, as you feel like you’re getting two sides of NHK yx’s style. Expanded to the extra offerings, though, the latter form proves to be the rule, with 1630 the exception: both 1040s and 1907 are of a similarly sparse vibe, and similarly interesting-but-not-necessarily memorable; amongst the three songs in this vein, though, 1057_s still stands apart.

1630 kicks off with some beatless synth layers, with skittery percussion soon backing it up. From this, a legitimate beat – built from the skitter – emerges, and the track just keeps building in this fashion, until a more traditional beat finally crashes through in its final moments. Perhaps noteworthy that it’s the shortest song here.

The B-side, or the second track, is more of a standard beat, but it has a clipped electro vibe that’s pretty cool, and NHK seems to be building it up in a similar fashion. But about the halfway mark… that stops, and the whole back half is winding it back down. Again, this is interesting, but it’s not as compelling.

The final two tracks don’t even do the build-up as much – they’re more “what you see is what you get” – though their electro makeup mimics 1057_s; they still sound good. Closer 1907 makes a play for something very clubby (filtered through the clipped, sparse percussion), and that gets me moving a bit.

So if you have the physical – it’s an amazing song and a good one; a teaser. The digital, though offering more music, exposes some repetition and so may be the lesser way to experience this.