Rave Review: Gooooose - Wriggle
SVBKVLT is one of the most outstanding and enduring labels championing experimental electronic music. Based in Shanghai, the imprint has cultivated a global presence, recently counting the likes of Björk and DJ Narciso among its ranks. Now, with his first release since 2023, local hero Gooooose makes a triumphant return on SVBKVLT, once again pushing electronic music forward with Wriggle.
Every track here is a standout. The crunching, metallic ruptures of “Chrome” lurch ahead, eerily reminiscent of a drunk AI robot scrambling to escape the laboratory. “Relay” feels engineered for lift-off, its synth line beaming dancefloor revelers straight into the heavens. The build-up on “Heifei” is almost too much to bear before it tears itself open into something far stranger than expected. “Doner” stretches the EP’s experimental logic to unfathomable lengths, while “Pistons” fires on all cylinders right through to the end.
Across the record, rapid-fire, stuttering beats snap and convulse with precision. It’s glitchcore dubstep for cyborgs—slick programming that feels like an Aphexian footwork collision, like Optimus Prime muscle spasms rattling through a speaker stack. This shit will ring your bell in the best possible way and leave you wanting more.
The reworks are just as strong. Hodge steps in on “Relay,” streamlining its frenetic pulse before accelerating it into a relentless dancefloor workout worthy of the Bristol heavyweight. Meanwhile, Beatrice M. brings a featherlight touch to the heaving “Pistons,” transforming Gooooose’s dubstep-tinged framework into her own fluid masterclass—no less physical, but elegantly reimagined.
Wriggle is easily one of the best releases of the year so far. Don’t sleep on it!
(The Lunatic is an Austin, Texas–based raver spreading the good word through his reviews and blog—and by selling the weirdest fucking electronic vinyl around.)
