For those of us accustomed to the sample-heavy tendency of RJD2’s freshman and sophomore releases Dead Ringer and Since We Last Spoke, respectively, his third studio album, The Third Hand, may come across as quite a leap from the marked trail. No longer does RJD2 limit himself to his role as a synthesizer, bringing together clear, catchy, and--albeit dated--groovy sound clips with driving beats to create vintage-sounding tracks with hip-hop sensibility; on this album, RJD2 offers his undivided talents as a musician and composer, offering the same sonic timbres but using his own vocals or live instruments as accompaniment. To some extent, this shift lends itself to an opening up, of sorts, to his musical range, but in the end, we are ultimately unfortunately left wanting more--and not in the way that a tasty appetizer leads the way to the main course.
In voicing all the instrumentation himself, RJD2 was, admittedly, embarking on an ambitious task for a relatively young producer, employing a solid ensemble of drum machines, guitars, and a fantastic selection of synths (including a vintage Hammond M3) to his cause. And luckily, on some tracks, RJD2 gets the formula down. On “Reality” and “Beyond the Beyond,” for example, RJD2 successfully creates ambient environments on the same page of what we know him for: pop-sensible, intricate melodies and movements--such as those found on “Ghostwriter” and “The Horror”--that have the ability to draw the casual listener in. However, on some tracks--on “Laws of the Gods” or “Paper Bubbles” for instance--the lack of sonic cohesion and overall vision (due, on these particular tracks, to the overbearing and unguided synth melody) muddles the sound that he is trying to find.
This is not to say, however, that The Third Hand fails to deliver completely. On those tracks that do work, RJD2 comes close to recreating the same sonic quality--synth flutters and sidewalk beats--that distinguish him from the rest of the crowd. On top of that, we finally get to attach a voice to the face, developing him further as a brandable, definable artist. However, on those tracks that don’t work, RJD2 experiments too much with his sound, opting for, a clean guitar or piano, for instance, over his traditional distorted synth, or ditching a more organized musical progression of melodies for a more abstract, and unfortunately, boring sound. Personallhy, I’m partial to a few of the tracks on The Third Hand, but only a few. On the whole, the album fails to meet expectations but gives plenty of hope for a more refined, developed, and piercing style on his fourth attempt that, hopefully, goes back to the basics.
