Artist: "Amon Tobin"
Album: "Supermodified"
Genre: Miscellaneous
Label: Ninja Tune

Reviewer: -RoG-
Posted: 5/6/2009

Review: I first discovered Amon Tobin back in 2000 when I heard one of his song playing in the background on some car commercial. I couldn't give a damn what the commercial was about, all I could think was "Who the hell wrote that amazing music!?" After much searching on the web, I finally found out that it was Amon Tobin. Then after visiting his official web site (which was an impressive Flash work at the time) and hearing some of his other tracks, I knew I had found somebody with a completely different style.

While he obviously has heavy jazz influences, the way he intermixes them with his trademark sonic mayhem is nothing short of amazing. Yes, like many DJs, he does a lot of sampling but he really strays from what you'd expect to happen next in any given song. Furthermore, all of his drum samples are ones that he performed himself, which really helps add to the jazzy feel of some tracks. Don't expect to hear any computer-generated beats from this guy (not that that's a bad thing, it's just nice that he goes the extra mile to create a sound that's truly his own).

It's hard to describe his music since he doesn't really match any other artists out there. You simply need to hear what he's done, and his "Supermodified" album still remains my favorite to this day even though he's created many other fantastic tracks since then. Best songs on the album would have to be "Four Ton Mantis", "Deo" and "Precursor". If you listen to nothing else, definitely check out those three tracks at the very least.

Amon is a tough act to classify, since I believe he really is in a distinct genre of his own creation. His music is complex and each song differs greatly from the next. There are no vocals to speak of other than a few samples here 'n there. It's all instrumental which makes it great music to listen to while working... and driving. I guess those car commercial people knew what they were doing when they used his music after all.

Overall rating:
(Scored on a 0.5 - 5 pickles rating: 0.5 being the worst and 5 being the best)