Fog

by Travis DragesetFog starts out as a spoken word and synthesizer melange, then segues to "Smell of Failure" ("I get this whiff in my nose sometimes," says Andrew Broder aka Fog, "Like a burning smell/It's the smell of failure"), which is a feedback-ensconced series of vocoder reps. At "Pneumonia" the album slows to a Neil Young-inspired dirge, then switches to scratches and samples. Surprises are around every turn. "Check Fraud" features rudimentary Japanese flute, sound effects, and lilting flamenco guitar. Broder was 23 at the time of this recording, and with it he pulls the listener into his single-minded diversions so that all can witness spurts of revelation within his quest for musical footing.