Crazy, man, crazy! If you've been disappointed by Squarepusher's little jazz forays, and have been looking for someone to take up the "totally tweaked out unrelenting anti-analog beats with harsh buzzes and weird little synth-pad ditties over the top" mantle, well then Datach'i might be just what you've been looking for.

The first time I put this one on I was buzzing around the living room like mad, sucking in the harsh digital sweetness, the cheezy keyboard melodies, the maladjusted robot with a faulty clock-chip beats, the sheer dopey goodness of it all. It's been getting better with every listen -- details emerging, beats rewiring my little brain, melodies getting lodged in there somewhere too. And with each listen I'm more impressed with the sheer amount of work that seems to have gone into these tracks -- no fill in the dots and hit play on the sequencer techno-shlock here. This is crazed, detailed, lovingly-constructed digital madness.

My only real complaint would be that there's one long sensitive-piano-and-strings-in-the-rain piece at the end of the CD that's in questionable taste...not that there's anything really wrong with it, but it's a bit precious and not nearly as creative or ambitious as the rest of the music here.

Still, fifteen out of sixteen is pretty good! If you're into fractured beats, weird noises and general good-natured creativity, you should check this one out.