As a musician, getting into the electronic genres of music is a bit like investing in a new PC. When you settle on a style, it'll inevitably become outdated in a matter of months. In a way, this is to be expected. Electronic music is in fact a cutting- edge, high- tech industry. One has to keep up with the tech. There's little difference between Ninja Tuna and Nokia. Both are trying to pump out new products that are sexier, but still functional (as rumpshaking aides and communication devices, respectively). But since some time has passed, both have resorted to gimmicks such as shiny, chrome cellphones or flashy, die- cut, gatefold slipcases. In this Darwinism- on- fast- forward field, Random is the 150mHz Pentium of jungle music.

Sap the jazz and soul from Roni Size and you'd end up with the boiled down, cold, robotic bleeps and beats of Random. The crisp digital crunch conjures images of huge empty rooms--abandoned factories converted into post- production and design facilities, reskeleted with aluminium, glass, chrome, ducts, and white paint. The minimal drum-n-bass of Random reminds me of shopping in a haute couture boutique. You know, the ones with five dresses on a ten- yard metal bar, purses made of corrugated steel and displayed on large seafoam cubes, and disinterested sales girls with Labrador black page cuts, geometrically precise bang horizons, acetate skirts, and no bar? This is the music you hear in those joints.

My greatest pleasure from this record came from the song titles. Unfortunately, not many others will get the references that tickled me. Random makes three references to Mark Leyner's "Et Tu, Babe?" on the record's sleeve. Anyone who's read the book should chuckle at "Bakin' Doughnuts" and "Lincoln's Morning Breath." Too bad I was more amused reliving book passages in my head than from the music. Read the book instead.

I have a strange feeling that machines are going to take over the earth and kill us humans. We've seen it in "Maximum Overdrive" and "The Terminator." Once they have control, they'll kill all musicians with their electric instruments. Organic human music will be replaced by digital funk, like Random's, and this is why we must fight! Onward Humans!

-Brent DiCrescenzo