Gonjasufi: Muzzle

Label: Warp

What's a "mini-album"? In the case of Muzzle, the new Gonjasufi record (which has a sticker declaring it to be this odd format), it's evidence that 24 (and a half) minutes is enough time to flow ten beat-trippy songs and song fragments together in a head-spinning mass. Static and transistor-radio vocals mix with dramatically soulful beats (slow, determined) on "Rubberband," while "Timeout" goes further out, an elegantly debauched vocal (male) swimming in a mist of crackle and piano keys. "Feedin' Birds" flips the script with a female soul vocal smashed through filters but, embedded in yet another swaggering rhythm, retaining all of its heart-tugging power. Is it a sample? Is it newly recorded? Sumach Ecks (Gonjasufi himself) knows... Shrouded in such mysteries, Muzzle does more in its "mini album" runtime than most can do with much more. Hungry heads will be well-fed and happy.