QUAKERS AND MORMONS - Evolvotron

Paolo “Maolo” Torreggiani and Andrea “Mancho” Mancin explore and dig deeper into the more hip-hop side of their original project My Awesome Mixtape on their debut as Quakers And Mormons, “Evolvotron”.

The tracks that work best are the ones that let symphonic samples (“Background, Foreground”) and chamber-electronic textures (“Bog”, “Plastic Bags”) flow beneath the tedious rap in the style of Why? and Tunde Adebimpe (though in some spots it gets more aggressive, closer to Beastie Boys).

The duo put it all together in a way that's more haphazard than experimental. On “Background, Foreground” the symphonic samples and a cappella vocals build into a crescendo (“Bog” is its chamber-music counterpart, a viola serenade over an irregular, gangsta-style beat). The sparse backing of “Down Is Up” collapses into a catchy falsetto-choir chorus and a medieval-folk breakdown. The Doors-esque melody of “The Prose” doesn't amount to much.

The most striking fusion of these elements comes on “Moldova” (a Stravinsky sample, choral voices, anxious rap). Some of that magic resurfaces on “Plastic Bags”, dominated by an Arabic horn looming over a mass of electronic voices.

“Taste Of Poland” stands apart from everything else, the only genuinely avant-garde track, where the dizzying samples give way to an electronic distortion that infects a finally psychotic rap.

Written by the two of them together, recorded in a remote studio in Pontecurone in the province of Alessandria, produced by Rico (Uochi Toki), the record by these two very young Bologna musicians, transplanted to Piedmont for the occasion, is more surprising for its sheer, erudite abundance of samples than for the moments where the show bursts into flourishes of poses and crowd-pleasing hooks. The flesh of these tracks also carries something pagan, esoteric. The result is an unusual alternative hip-hop record, anchored by Mancho's functionally claustrophobic bass work. A clarification: “Quakers and Mormons is a Throat and two Fingers”.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google

06/09/2011