EP Review: Digital Plastic Surgery

In Digital Plastic Surgery, Ngāmotu-based producer and vocalist Frau Knotz has arrived with a sophomore EP that drops us into a pulsating jungle of electronica that blends the retro-futurism of their debut with a fresh, rhythm-heavy mode that grips from start to finish.

The opening Animistic Ritual is an aptly named piece that surrounds the listener in a cacophony of bassy tom beats, sprinkled with dashes of synths that dance and echo around us. The consistent ‘drum circle’ foundation mixed with the high-pitched and fragmented synths create a stimulating visual quality that would absolutely go down a treat in the club. A very fitting an effective initial track.

Victory Dance on ZR3 is level-up in every way. It’s a high-paced nostalgia trip through the bleeps, beeps, and boops of an old arcade game. It’s like a soundtrack to beating the most intense and elusive level on your NES. This is about as retro electronica as you can get. Simple, rapid beats play under a dancing ensemble of synths, jumping up and down and in gliding lines to your high score. I’m to understand that ZR3 is both the 3rd planet within the Zeta Reticuli star system and a model of Panasonic digital camera; either would be a fitting premise for the character of the piece.

The pleasantly warm Khepri is a fitting respite for the centre of the EP, serving as a calming force with a more simple foundation to contrast its predecessor. It’s within the air and reverb between the notes over consistent and straightforward percussion and bass lines that gives the track a living, breathing quality. It’s like a slow-moving walk through a catacomb of firing neurons, while simultaneously basking in a radiant glow that demands nothing of the listener, or the setting, other than tranquility. The length of the piece allows it to bloom naturally, feeding us unexpected chord changes and engaging breakdowns, but it wisely refrains from building into any moments of intensity and instead dedicates it’s only crescendos to changes in the timbre of the rhythm, keeping the listener in the sun, stimulated and nourished until the final note of the blossoming track, like photosynthesis itself.

We’re pulled out of this repose by Left Eye Lunar with a fast-paced kick drum that you feel force its way down to your chest and command some form of release through movement. A building chaos ensues, evoking images of a high-speed chase through a crowded city street. Seemingly random notes combat equally unpredictable percussion and other sound effects, all the while never dipping too far into the disorder that it becomes overwhelming. It’s especially prevalent here just how well-done the production is, no doubt indicative of a shared direction within the collaboration between Knotz and Sam Johnson at Rhythm Ace Studio.

In the final track, Consumer Culture, we’re left with a warping soundscape of a world obsessed with materialistic insatiability; an audio exhibition of a culture that is in itself warped. Heaving bass drums and minimal snare-hits almost serve to suspend an aura of closure in each bar, often leaving us in limbo as a series of chants reverberate in the spaces, accompanied by an arpeggiated synth. Save for various voicings throughout the EP, the only words spoken in the entire project appears here. Modulating voices simply state “I love it” with various pitch and accentuation, creating an almost frightening series of images of superficiality and ultimately unfulfilling consumption. This gives way to a breakdown section of a jingle quartet that sounds straight out of a mid-20th century TV or radio commercial for the next thing you’ll be sure to love even more than the last, before itself spiraling and warping into a pitch-bent and depleted finale. Oh how I do love a bit of cynical commentary to cap off my listening.

Frau Kotz has constructed a brief, yet brilliantly engaging collection of songs with remarkable quirks and characteristics that touch upon and explore various corners of an underrated genre with a history that is in itself brief. Such an eclectic breed invites endless possibilities that can celebrate and build upon the works that came before, as well as open doors and direct towards new worlds, sounds and visions, of which Knotz is clearly an avid and willing voyager.