Pitchfork

I'm glad this book is on tape, 'cause I'm imagining the large-print version and it isn't pretty: Rat-tat-tat-tat-BAM-rat-tat-BAM, chugga chugga, etc. Hard on the eyes. Right away, you know Todd Drootin is on some freaky shit: Not only does the cover art's Books on Tape logo have an umlaut over the "p", but it also has them under the "k" and the "n." Dude, stop, I can't even do that with my keyboard! Drootin, on the other hand, can do lots with his various inputs, drum machines, and samplers, and while Dinosaur Dinosaur makes for good interstate driving music, it might have you concerned you've drifted onto the rumble strip.

Speaking of audio-lit, this project shouldn't be confused with that of better-known electronic manipulators the Books. Where that group is solemnly stony, Drootin's beatscapes are more deranged and abrasive. As sonic reshaping goes, Dinosaur Dinosaur is less interested in making a statement-- for instance, there are no broad intuitive leaps between recognizable samples-- than in making a racket, pulling open a silverware drawer full of variously-oxidized but uniformly spindly percussion on the profoundly apolitical "Noise Is Political", then sending it down the terror chute of "Killing Machine", ravaged with clipped syllables and rhythmic moans, a punchy staccato melody and floppy bass, and a stabbing swarm of synths.

Mellower tracks like "Surly Ambassador" sound like Jason Forrest tweaking a long Boards of Canada loop until he just can't take it anymore, then ratcheting it up to a hectic house bounce that picks up debris like a Katamari before collapsing into a sinister dirge. This music can't sit still: Densely detailed and riotous mini-compositions frantically leapfrog over each other; old grooves split before they wear out their welcome and come back with new haircuts; the electronic scalpel makes mincemeat of the obsolete analog cadaver. And later, the dumb tropicalia of "Bubblegum" gets flash-frozen by the shifting digitalia blowing around it, and the anthemic guitars on "Upon Rock City" decay into stuttering glitch-fests at both ends: rock music body-modded toward ambiguity in the age of elective sonic surgery.