Recently Jon Hopkins’ name has been on the tongues of several industry heavyweights. He’s worked with everyone from Herbie Hancock to Coldplay, the latter of which used a reworked version of Hopkins’ ‘Light Through the Veins’ to cap their Viva La Vida album. He was raised as a concert pianist and infused with an adolescent lust for all things electronica. Since his serene 2001 debut he has evolved tremendously. There definitely is something visceral about Jon Hopkins’ music – making the title of his third effort all the more appropriate. Hopkins’ creative edge comes from his cybernetic fusion of sounds. Pleasant ambient backgrounds and piano compositions are suddenly ruptured by earth-shattering kick drums and bizarre electronic crackles and buzzes. His talent as a musician shines through in his ability to avoid having his theoretically contrasting influences sound forced together. If anything he has made them compliment each other. This is especially apparent on tracks like ‘Vessel,’ on which Hopkins’ gentle piano gives way to a slow driving dancefloor beat that drops so hard you think the speakers might burst. The title track is a rattling industrial piece that only grinds with increasing force as it progresses. ‘Light Through the Veins’ is one of the more subdued ambient pieces, on which soft drum programming backs slowly building ambient keyboard chimes. Hopkins even offers a couple solo piano compositions with ‘Small Memory’ and ‘Autumn Hill,’ serving to taper the album’s erratic energy and leave the listener with a pleasant aftertaste.

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