t’s nice when you put on an album to hear everything coming at you in clear, pure sound, each individual part separated out and pure in their clarity. Electronic albums can be great for that, the computers enforcing a level of detail and lucidity.

And of course, a smeary, grotty sound that sounds like half of the dials are in the red with all the instruments merging at the edges has its own charms. Electric Turn To Me has a band from New York and a frontwoman from Germany, and they’ve opted for the latter approach; even on a calmer track like “Cornelius” the keyboards and guitar lurch blearily together, melding in unexpected places. And on the more frantic “Pick Up The Trail” the sound nears collapse on the chorus, which is of course wonderful.

“Pick Up The Trail” is the best thing here, even if it sounds exactly what I would expect the Yeah Yeah Yeahs to sound like if they added keyboards, but still didn’t have a bass player. Keep in mind that I have yet to hear a single YYYs song. So maybe a better analogy is the unruly offspring of Elastica and Royal Trux, albeit only musically rather than lyrically. And admittedly, that may be mostly based on the wonderfully thick production than anything else; the actual music is pretty straightforward, with nice keyboard melodies and strongly functional guitars.

Mostly, though, this EP is just chock full of tics; tics that originally I found pretty annoying but that steadily grew on me until they were what I liked about the band. Everything from singer Silke’s voice to the band’s name to the structure of “20 Eyes In The Car” to the hyperdramatic closer “One Second” (which is as full of yearning as I’ve imagined “Maps” is, although again I have no idea if this is true). “Wrestle With Me Angel” still doesn’t sit as well with me as the rest of the EP, but four out of five is a more than respectable hit rate your second time out.

I’m not sure if this sort of music is now a crowded field, as other than the obvious suspects I haven’t really been paying attention to the scene, but Electric Turn To Me have crafted a neat little EP here, and the whole turning-your-minuses-into-plusses trait is pretty crucial for a small band. If you give them a chance, silly band name and all, they might get enough time to make a pretty damned good album.