"Green Language" starts off Nick Forte's PASTED LAKES with a blast of guitar noise that eventually cycles into melody. This is what to expect, pretty much: crunchy, off-kilter beats and dense squalls of sound. "Blender Dance," for instance, deconstructs a 4/4 house track, while "Forgotten Music" is like a gamelan lost in outer space. For the most part, though the tracks are short, almost fragmentary, defying traditional song structure ("Drumming in Circles," "Kill Your Carpet") for pure abstraction, rough edges included ("Cram Corridor," "Swallowing Gel"). So the moments when Forte decides to be more traditional ("Sugar Lemoned," "Thistle Rue," "Wolf Cry") stand out that much more amidst the din. Forte plays up these differences, injecting ambient breaks ("Crack and Crevice," "Join Us") into the mix to suggest a tension between these poles, but I wonder if this only muddles things further. Regardless, Forte's excursions into sound are definitely worth a listen, even if they haven't quite reached fruition.