There he was, this musically lucked child of a once-priest and a near-nun, 12 years old and piled high with a Radio Shack combo stereo, stacks of records, and pockets full of dubbed tapes. It was 1984 and Martin Dosh was orchestrating the soundtracks to his junior high school dances, playing only the choice cuts for the budding romantics and perspiring wallflowers: Run DMC, Prince, Devo, the Cars, New Order...

Assembled on the fly (“real-time performative production” according to artist Jon Davis), Ghostband’s Verdical is a construction of fetishized "glitch(es) and groove(s)" – individual compositions that transfigure through repetition, syncopation and red herring noises. It's uncertain whether Davis has tapped into a contemporary mania or synthesized a manic – and, at times, maniacal – electronic sound response to the times. Either way, the album waxes feverish and never wanes, building and razing its pockets of pop catharsis in whims that appear both well-studied and fresh-eared.