When they formed Jockstrap, two London music students combined forces for a sound that stretched into imaginative territory well beyond their individual strengths. On their debut EP, 2018's Love Is the Key to the City, Georgia Ellery's pristine songwriting was dismantled by Taylor Skye's lawless electronic processing, landing the duo in a strange space between indie balladry and glitchy remixes. That early material was softened by the string contributions of fellow music school attendees, giving the EP a mellow chamber pop glow. With second EP Wicked City, their first recordings for experimental electronic stronghold Warp Records, Jockstrap venture into far harsher places. The five songs here play more into the group's penchant for unpredictable production and vocal processing. Opening track "Robert" is a boiling cauldron of hard, cut-up drums, with Ellery's deadpan vocals pitch-shifted into evil forms and a lengthy feature from rapper Stepa J. Groggs of Injury Reserve. Lyrical fragments about God, angels, money, and the devil sometimes rise up from the noise. This song is as far from their earlier sound as Jockstrap gets, but they return to warped production of lilting strings and nostalgic melodies on songs like "Acid" or the lazy glide of the piano-led "Yellow in Green." Ellery's songwriting at times hints at the influence of Fiona Apple, Joni Mitchell, and even Van Dkye Parks. The duo's magic comes in the clash between Ellery's gentle, almost introverted pop writing and Skye's restless production that is always aiming to subvert the songs before they get too accessible. Wicked City, while brief, still overstuffs its short running time with so many ideas that it's sometimes hard to get a hold on the songs as they're submerged in a whirlpool of extraneous sounds. That willful deconstruction is the entire point, and Wicked City explores the extreme limits of how far a pretty song can be mangled until it crumbles completely. When the experiments are at their most successful, they can be truly transcendent.