I love those Star Wars posters they have that are composed of a mosaic of tiny stills from the movie. Ya stand back... and there's Yoda, squinting in his green, wizened, wrinkled, pointy way. Ya walk forward and squint... and there's a stormtrooper firing a phaser! Whoa, dude... it, like, tricks my eyes and shit! I probably find it especially gratifying because I could never get those illusion posters to work. Sweat beading on my brow, astigmatism throbbing, I'd stare and stare, feeling like a lesser being because I couldn't see the dolphins.

The Freshmaka is like those Star Wars posters. Here's an album that, on a quick and superficial level, appears to be standard fare for that section of your local record store that falls between "DI" and "DK." It's got the beats, the scratches, the samples and the breaks. At first glance, it's merely competent-- just our picture of Yoda. But, with a little aural squinting, I Am the Freshmaka reveals itself as a mosaic of twisted sounds and innumerable samples; some appearing and disappearing like daydreams. Add to that the juicy funk beats, the laid-back, textured rhythms and the cross-genre influences, and you've got something apart from the pack.

It's difficult to pigeonhole, which is what I like about it. Though most would call it dance (or, more intimidatingly, techno), every track reeks with real, organic instrumentation that offsets the often heavy beats. Each track takes an indirect path to its conclusion, often lingering in time changes or circling around shades of a motif before finally winding down.

While the album shares many common elements employed by your everyday waxmaster, the Freshmaka manages to use these soon-to-be clichés with a reserved hand. Yes, there's the instructional sample on making records, but it only lasts a bit, and has an original edge unpossessed by the last six DJs I've heard use the vehicle. And, rather than making the samples the theme of his album, you get plenty of other sorts of oddities to wrap your kif-addled brain around. Example: In "Lotta Love (Get Up Thru Da Night '99)," what initially sounds like a gratingly repetitive, indecipherable noise, eventually resolves into a warped sample of someone saying "Clap your hands." Yeh. The same track also drops in the sampled honey vocals of 70's pop star Nicolette Larson from her 1979 hit of the same name.

Anyway, I dig it. It's far more original than most of what I've seen from this genre recently, and that's a good thing. Even if I can't see the dolphins.

-James P. Wisdom