let me begin by confessing to an enormous bias - i happen to enjoy erase errata a great deal. they rock feminist, they rock dissonant, and they rock funky. they are one of the few bands that manage to lay down solid (albeit staccato to the point that i don't understand how they preserve the sanctity of their bass/guitar strings) grooves without just re-interpreting james brown or liquid liquid. they have intelligent lyrics, an elusive skronked-out trumpet, and a list of admirers that rivals that of any band i know (black dice, weasel walter of the flying luttenbachers, the locust, the tragically-departed arab on radar, lightning bolt, get hustle...)
i would imagine that, in order to commence the sort of hyper-spastic-seizure dance that this music facilitates as soon as possible, any self-respecting funk junkie would already own this tiny wonder. unfortunately, i am sure that is not the case. i myself was skeptical of the $8 pricetag. that is, until now...
numbers lay down two tracks of solid no-wave action to start off, and both are enjoyable despite reliance on electronics that seems a little excessive. though neither is anywhere close to the whitey-tighty funk of radio pop, the first, "goin' insane," somehow manages to to construct a relatively conventional song structure. it is followed by the explosive "palo alto", which destroys it with finesse in 58 seconds.
touch�.
track three announces the coming of erase errata, who are immediately absolved from disappointing showings on their black dice and nfjm splits. their first, a little slower than usual, has a nice post-punk-ish feel to it until about a minute in, at which point some bizarre pedal effect kicks in with an ominous sort of throbbing sound (trust me, it's groovy). is that a cowbell? anyway, the next is a little closer to the sort of material that made other animals (the erase errata lp) so much fun, but its superior production values provide some nice bass to counteract the insane treble of the guitars. some trumpet noodling and biting lyrics complete the package. excellent work, you devils.
can be found on the tigerbeat6 website, where you can also find the numbers full-length and remix albums of both artists (yeah, i know, but it's an electro label). try troubleman for the erase errata lp and an ep from numbers, if you can figure out how to get anywhere on their mess of a website.