Allegedly recorded back in 2003, then resurrected and reworked last year for the 30th anniversary of Libythth,Uvwxyz is a strange record from an even stranger project. With a heavy misuse of sampled instruments and random sounds, what could be pure chaos somehow is anything but. Libythth somehow solidifies sputtering samples and found clips into memorable songs and miraculously congeal the most random of sounds into something catchy and memorable.
"Blixa" is a great piece to dissect: Libythth takes what sounds like a microsample of voice and a rigid drum machine and mixes in siren bursts with cut up weather forecasts. Wobbly guitar gives a melodic anchor that everything is built on top of, before at the end going full techno throb in structure. Structurally techno, yes, but sonically it is anything but. "Festa" is another, somewhat explainable one: Libythth blends chiming guitars into janky breakbeats, then introduces some pseudo-metal guitar riffs transition into a calypso-influenced beat and overall murky mix.
There is a cartoon-like quality to Uvwxyz, but one in pure surrealist mode. "Argelp" is a jaunty, cut up melody on top of out of tune guitar sounds, shifting into an occasional digital synth lead that is more stutter than anything else. The mood does vary though, with something like "Vrsqyt," where Libythth leads off with falling, bleak tones that eventually lock into a bass guitar led groove that lets a bit of light in, and eventually shifts to a skittering drum and bass sound paired with some jazz-damaged guitar. That overused, distorted buzzing synth lead from so many late '90s/early 2000s dance records pops up on "Xñynxya," but in a sequence that is just off, and ends up underscoring cut up passages, video game noises, and random sample outbursts.
Even the more understated songs, like "Thuthe" sputter away, rhythms being constructed and then pulled apart by Libythth. Beats end up reversed, but memorable melodies propel the oddness. "Zhingchaw" features a mostly steady thump over filtered, bent synths before eventually having more of a guitar focus. Understated may only be in relative terms here, but "Seaya" features some jazz-tinged bass and also is overall somewhat restrained compared to the rest of the record.
"Wwaww" is anything but subtle or restrained, sitting somewhere between jazzy piano passages and a sample-based synth malfunctioning dramatically. The album-closing "Oøystr" is the most jarring song, since not only is it a song with full, decipherable vocals, it is also a classic rock cover that, due to the lack of writing credits on the sleeve likely sits somewhere between cover and parody from a legal perspective. So, I will not say what the song actually is, but the title is a definite clue.
The work of the mysterious Libythth is certainly not easy to describe. An almost comical rush of seemingly random samples, intentionally out of tune melodies and just plain weirdness somehow gels wonderfully, locking into distinct grooves and memorable, often melodic. At times the best way to describe it is as if Libythth took the MIDI files for an instrumental pop record, but then randomly changed all of the instruments that were sequenced to drastically different presets. The actual songwriting that drives the chaos, however, is where Uvwxyz excels. There are more than a few melodies and bass lines that stuck with me after the record was over, even if they were constructed from police sirens or quacking ducks.
