Postmodern hijinks have become such a staple of contemporary pop music that genre bending and blending are hardly news anymore. What artist hasn't ransacked the back catalog of some long-lost funk or soul label, or lifted grooves from obscure jazz hepcats or, for the even more adventurous, modern classical composers?
On that score, the approach taken by Max Tundra (real name Ben Jacobs) on his third album, "Mastered by Guy at the Exchange," isn't so revolutionary. But while other musicians aspire to a seamless meld of styles -- or at the very least (as with Cornelius, for example) a seamless segue between different styles of songs -- Tundra tries to squeeze everything into the same three- or four-minute tune.
"61over," for example, begins as a chatty piece of electro and slowly strengthens to full dance speed until it dissolves into a repetitive, Steven Reich-inspired, minimalist piano interlude with a heartfelt, barely audible vocal in the background. As if that isn't enough, the piano then goes all honky-tonk, in the promise of perhaps an Elton John-style hook, before abruptly ending.