The chimes, clicks, and percussive beats heard on The Mobius Band's 'Three' EP are an old chestnut. We have heard them before. Perhaps not in this setting, not in this wood. But we know them, just as you know the guy who seems to show up at every show you attend. The Mobius Band surround their slyly standard indie rock songs with a swirl of electronics. The tactic is more successful in some songs than others. Most noticeably, the instrumental songs on "Three" have a hard time distinguishing themselves because the synth effects and the beat processors which The Mobius Band use are nothing new, and nothing novel is done with them. The more successful songs, like "Arrow," have at their core simply a strong rock song, regardless of the electronics dancing around them. And that is what the electronics really amount to: sonic flourishes on top of rock songs, dressing on salad. The electronic instrumentation feels superfluous, though in a live setting it admittedly could add color to improvisational parts. On record, it ends up tasting rather like a stale Tortoise song, which is already likely covered with bacterium. When The Mobius Band fire up a long instrumental track, I tend to forget about them. When the Mobius Band sing, I am more apt to listen.
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