Stunt Rhythms, the latest full-length from noted boundary-pushing experimental electronic musician Amon Tobin (working here under the pseudonym Two Fingers), opens with a throbbing sawtooth bassline, breakneck rhythmic turnarounds, and a wobbling midrange synth lead; a baffling move considering that those are the unmistakable trademarks of Americanized dubstep. Tobin has made his name on nearly two decades of highly technical sound manipulation, like the intricately tweaked field recordings that have made up most of his recent output, so a listener initially confronted with "Stripe Rhythm" might suspect that the brainy, meticulous knob-twiddler might be having a laugh at the expense of his own reputation as a brainy, meticulous knob-twiddler. Further exploration of the record confirms this suspicion.
Stunt Rhythms is less a fully realized album than a collection of experiments where Tobin messes around with pop music idioms that his snobbier fans might find beneath him: arena EDM, grime, hip-hop. Overall it's like flipping through the sketchbook of a respected conceptual artist only to find it full of expertly rendered pornographic cartoons. Whether it's a unique opportunity to peek into a talented musician's creative process or a throwaway collection of sonic gags depends on your tastes.
To his credit, Tobin never treats the styles he's dabbling in with condescension. While he toys with listeners' expectations in each of the genres he tackles, he always shows respect for their aesthetic frameworks. When he pushes a style's sonic boundaries, he litters his tracks with nods to some of its defining sounds-- the Beasties-worthy cowbell in the grime-rap hybrid "Snap", for instance, or the impressively gnarled synthesizer wub-wubs on the more EDM-leaning tracks. In most of the areas where he's experimenting, a song can live or die based on the novelty of its individual sounds; Tobin's expert ability to warp synths and samples into compellingly twisted one-of-a-kind shapes means most of his genre workouts actually work out.
The cost of all of this casual experimentation is a lack of focus that touches nearly every cut on Stunt Rhythms. Most of the songs clock in close to three minutes, and while this brevity prevents them from overstaying their welcome, it also doesn't leave them much room to go anywhere. Most repeat one or two parts a couple of times and then simply end. This can be frustrating when the song fragments point somewhere interesting. "Sweden", with its smeary low end, and "Defender Rhythm", which evokes the arcade-era video games, could both work as backing tracks for a sufficiently daring rapper, but if they had something like a defined verse-chorus-verse structure they'd be monsters. On the other hand "Magoo"-- whose bumptious rhythm, pinched funk keyboards, vowel-y synth croaks, and oblique titular reference seem to suggest Tobin's best Timbaland impression-- gets out of the way just before it starts to get irritating.
Despite its sketchy nature, Stunt Rhythms has obvious appeal to certain kinds of listeners: DJs of a certain bent have some breaks to work into their sets, and established Amon Tobin fans will walk away with a new perspective on an established artist. Everyone else will likely want to stick to the more fully realized stuff he releases under his given name.
